SPIRITUAL 
DESPONDENCY 

AND 

TEMPTATIONS 




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SPIRITUAL DESPONDENCY 

AND 

TEMPTATIONS 



SPIRITUAL DESPONDENCY 



AND 

TEMPTATIONS 

BY 

REV. P. J. MICHEL 

OF THE SOCIETY OF JESUS 

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH BY 
REV. F. P. GARESCH& 

OF THE SAME SOCIETY 
REVISED -A^I^ CORRECTED" >: 



NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, CHICAGO 
BENZIGER BROTHERS 

PRINTERS TO THE HOLY APOSTOLIC SEE 
1904 



Ntijil BMaL 



MAR U 1904 

f "J - / q i\- 
CLASS a/ XX* No 

8 2. 4 2. 

COPY 6 






ETiijil ®tetat 



Emprttnatur* 



J. GRIMMELSMAN, SJ. 



REMIGIUS LAFORT, S.T.L. 

Censor Librorum. 



# JOHN M. FARLEY, 

Archbishop of New York. 



New York, January 2, 1904, 



Copyright, 1904, by Benziger Brothers. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

To Pious and Devout Souls: — 

I present you this little book, confident 
of its value — it is the posthumous work 
of a Priest who was not only a member of 
a celebrated society and a Professor of 
Theology, but was also a pious and en- 
lightened director. 

In this book you will therefore find 
wholesome instruction, great knowledge 
of the interior life, and of the human 
heart, — the result of years of experience 
in the direction of souls. 

The subject is at once both highly im- 
portant and very difficult. The Author 
has not confined himself to general prin- 
ciples and vague maxims, but he has 



6 EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

entered into the very sanctuary of the 
soul, into its secret folds and most intri- 
cate windings. The thread of Reason, 
the light of Faith, and the torch of Expe- 
rience have led him safely through that 
labyrinth where so many lose themselves, 
rashly attempting to explore it without 
the proper guides. A few principles, pre- 
sented under different aspects, solve all 
difficulties, throw light upon doubts that 
are ever recurring, expose all the subter- 
fuges of self-love, sloth, and cowardice, 
refute their objections, and silence their 
excuses. 

The Author has followed the most use- 
ful plan for works of this kind. He adopts 
the method of reasoning — and his reason- 
ing is as clear as it is solid. The greater 
number of persons who profess piety pre- 
fer appeals to their imagination and to 
their heart, rather than to their reason. 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 7 

They like to be excited by lively descrip- 
tions, and by tender and touching lan- 
guage; but in so doing, they are seeking 
a passing gratification rather than a real 
and permanent benefit. Such descriptions 
and sentiments soon fade away, but the 
fruits of conviction are more lasting. Pure 
reason and true faith never vary; imagi- 
nation and feeling are incessantly changing 
according to the different objects which 
act upon them. 

It is from indolence that feeling is pre- 
ferred to reasoning. The greater part of 
mankind are indolent, and hence there are 
so few who care to reflect and reason. 
But one who has an earnest love for virtue 
and duty, who is anxious about his salva- 
tion, should not shrink from the mental 
effort which the exercise of reason and of 
faith requires. We should remember that 
no sincere and permanent resolution can be 



8 EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

taken without a conviction of its necessity. 
This is according to the natural order of 
reason, and to the economy of grace. The 
understanding must be enlightened before 
the will can be moved. 

This work appears to be specially in- 
tended for the instruction of persons living 
in religious communities, and for seculars 
aiming at perfection; but in this age of 
indifference and discouragement all who 
profess the true faith may here find no 
little help to undeceive them in their errors, 
and to strengthen them against the wiles 
of self-love. We venture to hope that 
even Directors of consciences may dis- 
cover therein that which will increase their 
light, and supply for any want of expe- 
rience in their difficult and dangerous 
ministry. 



CONTENTS. 



I. On the dangers and fatal effects of de- 
spondency 15 

II. The most fatal effect of despondency is 
that the soul that yields to it does not 
view it as a temptation. Hope and 
confidence in God are as much a com- 
mandment as faith and the other virtues 17 

III. Source and cause of the impressions which 

despondency makes on the soul of the 
Christian 21 

IV. Of the true motive for Christian hope — this 

motive is the same for all men . . 26 

V. A powerful motive for confidence is the in- 
finite value of the sufferings and merits 
of Jesus Christ 31 

VI. Motive of confidence for the religious soul 
in the mercy which God has shown in 
selecting her for the grace of her voca- 
tion. False ideas and feelings which 
we ascribe to God . . . -37 
9 



io CONTENTS. 



VII. Our repeated infidelities ought not to make 
us lose confidence in God — it is the 
want of faith that makes us fear . . 44 

VIIL God is never so near to us to assist us in 
our conflicts as when we imagine Him 
far away. He hides Himself only that 
we may seek Him and find Him . . 47 

IX. We cannot conquer without fighting — and 

there is no fighting without trouble . 51 

X. It is tempting God and tempting one's self 
to be solicitous about the conflicts that 
may await us 62 

XI. Of weariness, disgust, and difficulties in the 
service of God — causes of a discour- 
agement contrary to reason . . 67 

XII. It is not well to ask God to put an end to 
our trials and difficulties, and to desire 
the immediate fulfilment of our prayers 76 

XIII. We would wish the Almighty to do all for 

us, and to give us the victory without 
its costing us anything: a pernicious 
error, an unfair request, and a common 
cause of discouragement ... 84 

XIV. Discouragement occurs because we will not 

profit by the ordinary aid which is 
within our reach, but, through a slothful 
feeling, wait for extraordinary graces . 89 



CONTENTS. 1 1 



XV. It is false and dangerous to think that we 
can do nothing to resist certain inclina- 
tions and habits which overcome us . 99 

XVI. Our spiritual exercises a cause of repug- 
nance, because we falsely think them 
useless or the occasions of new faults . 109 

XVII. Imperfect motives, joining themselves to an 
intention otherwise pure, are another 
source of discouragement . . .123 

XVIII. It is an error to suppose that we should not 
offer our actions to God because they 
have not that perfection which we desire 
or think necessary . . . .140 

XIX. A loss of sensible devotion an unjustifi- 
able cause of despondency . . .148 

XX. Faults committed by pious souls in time of 

desolation 154 

XXI. One of our pretexts for abandoning prayer 
is that we lose our time. This is usually 
false, and often criminal when true. 
How to occupy ourselves usefully in 
time of prayer 165 

XXII. To strive for sensible devotion is useless, 
often dangerous, and gives occasion 
for despondency 172 



12 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER PAGE 

XXIII. On the use of spiritual books during time 

of prayer, or when attending Mass . 181 

XXIV. What books we should use during prayer 

and what plan we should adopt in their 
perusal . . . . . 188 

XXV. Temptations no proof of God's having 
abandoned us. If sometimes a mark 
of His anger, it is an anger tempered 
by mercy 199 

XXVI. Temptations no sign of a dangerous state 
of the soul in regard to God and 
salvation 205 

XXVII. In temptation recourse must be had to 
God. He sustains us in the combat 
although we do not perceive it . . 209 

XXVIII. How to recognize whether we have con- 
sented to the temptation . . .212 

XXIX. On short and passing temptations . .217 

XXX. On temptations which are persistent and 
troublesome, and on those which make 
an impression on our senses . .221 

XXXI. On temptations which disturb us in the 
exercise of virtues. We must not 
abandon a good work because of the 
defect or the imperfect motive which 
accompanies it. We must renounce 
the one and persevere in the other . 227 



CONTENTS. 



13 



CHAPTER 

XXXII. 



XXXIII. 

XXXIV. 
XXXV. 



XXXVI. 
XXXVII. 



Temptations not to be reasoned with. 

Means of banishing them. . . 232 

On frequent temptations. "In time of 

peace, prepare for war " . . . 245 

The utility of temptations . . . 252 

The subject continued. One who is sub- 
ject to temptations and desirous of 
saving his soul, attaches himself the 
more closely to God and exercises 
the greater vigilance . . .258 

The good effects of temptation in negli- 
gent souls 265 

The time spent in overcoming tempta- 
tions is not time lost . . . 270 



SPIRITUAL DESPONDENCY AND 
TEMPTATIONS. 

CHAPTER L 

ON THE DANGERS AND FATAL EFFECTS OF 
DESPONDENCY. 

Despondency is the most dangerous 
temptation that the enemy of our salva- 
tion can employ. In other temptations 
he attacks some one virtue in particular, 
and shows himself openly: by despond- 
ency he attacks them all, but covertly. 
The snare is readily perceived in other 
temptations: one finds in religion, often 
even in reason, principles which con- 
demn them. The knowledge of the evil, 
to which we cannot blind ourselves, con- 

15 



1 6 DANGERS OF DESPONDENCY. 

science, and the truths of religion which 
are awakened, serve as helps to sustain 
us. But in despondency there is nothing 
to lean upon : we feel that reason does 
not suffice to enable us to practise all 
the good that God requires of us. On 
the other hand, we dare not hope to re- 
ceive from God all the help we need to 
overcome our passions; thus we become 
discouraged and nearly reduced to de- 
spair, the very point to which the devil 
tries to lead the despondent soul. 

In other temptations we clearly per- 
ceive that it is wrong to allow the mind 
to dwell upon them ; but in despondency, 
which disguises itself under a multiplic- 
ity of forms, we see strong motives for 
yielding to the feeling which we do not 
look upon as a temptation. This feel- 
ing, however, makes us imagine that 
perseverance in the practice of virtue is 



EFFECT OF DESPONDENCY. 17 

impossible, and it leaves the soul liable 
to be overcome by all its passions. It 
is therefore of the utmost importance to 
avoid this snare. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE MOST FATAL EFFECT OF DESPONDENCY IS 
THAT THE SOUL THAT YIELDS TO IT DOES 
NOT VIEW IT AS A TEMPTATION. HOPE AND 
CONFIDENCE IN GOD ARE AS MUCH A COMMAND- 
MENT AS FAITH AND THE OTHER VIRTUES. 

The great danger of despondency is 
that, being deceived by an excessive fear 
which makes us blind to the truth, and 
being discouraged at the sight of diffi- 
culties against which we find no resource 
in ourselves, we nevertheless do not look 
upon this state as the effect of tempta- 
tion. Could we only see it in that light, 



1 8 EFFECT OF DESPONDENCY. 

we should beware of the suggestions that 
entertain it, and should get rid of our 
trouble more quickly and more easily. 

Let it, however, be well understood that 
despondency is a temptation, and bears 
all the marks of being such ; for every 
feeling that is opposed to the law of God, 
either in itself or by the consequences 
it may have, is evidently a temptation. 
It is thus we judge of every temptation 
to which we are liable. If we have a 
thought against faith, a feeling against 
charity or some other virtue, we look 
upon it as a temptation; we turn away 
from it, and try to elicit acts opposed to 
the thought or feeling which has put us in 
danger of offending God. 

Now, hope and confidence in God are 
commanded equally with faith and the 
other virtues. Therefore the feeling which 
is opposed to hope is as much forbidden 



EFFECT OF DESPONDENCY. 19 

as that which is against faith or any other 
virtue : it has thus every feature of a real 
temptation. 

The law of God obliges us frequently 
to make acts of faith, hope, and charity; 
and hence forbids us all wilful feelings 
contrary to these sacred and necessary 
virtues. How, then, can despondency be 
viewed otherwise than as a temptation, and 
even as a very dangerous temptation, since 
it exposes the Christian soul to abandon 
every work of piety ? 

To make this danger clearer to you, 
consider the general course of conduct 
among men. Is it not the hope of success, 
of procuring some advantage, of avoiding 
some evil, or of satisfying some desire or 
passion, which makes them act, supports 
them under their labors, and animates them 
to overcome their difficulties ? Take away 
from them all hope, and they would soon 



20 EFFECT OF DESPONDENCY. 

fall into inaction. None but a madman 
would strive for an object which he despairs 
of obtaining. In religious life despondency 
produces the same effect ; it is founded on 
the same principle, the want of means to 
reach the end which we propose to ourselves. 
When we lose all hope of overcoming 
the difficulties which we may find in the 
practice of any virtue, we do not try, or 
but feebly, to make the effort to do so. 
These insufficient efforts only increase our 
weakness, and being more than half over- 
come by despondency, we are easily led 
away by the passion that sways us. The 
sense of our weakness first throws us into 
doubt and into trouble. In that state, 
occupied only by the difficulty of the com- 
bat, we do not distinguish the principles 
that ought to guide us. The fear of not 
succeeding prevents us from employing 
the means which God has given us, and we 



IMPRESSIONS OF DESPONDENCY. 21 

are thus defenceless against our enemy. 
We are like a child who, seeing the ap- 
proach of, a giant, begins to tremble, and 
forgets that a stone thrown in the name of 
the Lord may lay him prostrate. In the 
same manner do we forget that we have a 
powerful help in the goodness of a tender 
Father, upon whom we have only to call, 
to be victorious in all our struggles. 



CHAPTER III. 

SOURCE AND CAUSE OF THE IMPRESSIONS WHICH 
DESPONDENCY MAKES ON THE SOUL OF THE 
CHRISTIAN. 

I shall now proceed to show why de- 
spondency makes such strong and fatal 
impressions on us. We are well convinced 
of our weakness, for we have often experi- 
enced it. We feel keenly the difficulty we 



22 IMPRESSIONS OF DESPONDENCY. 

have to overcome ourselves, as we succeed 
but rarely. Filled with these sad and 
discouraging reflections of our want of 
strength, and of the little we do to please 
God, we consider it useless to have re- 
course to Him, who, we think, will not 
hearken to our prayer whilst we are in our 
present state. Sad evidence of the pride 
of the human heart, that would wish to 
owe to itself the good which it does, and 
the happiness to which it aspires! And 
how opposed to the words of the Holy 
Ghost, " What hast thou that thou hast 
not received?" (i Cor. iv. 7.) 

In such a state we see and depend 
only upon our own efforts, so that our de- 
spondency diminishes, ceases, returns, or 
increases, according as we act well or ill. 
We do not reflect that it is only from the 
mercy of God we can hope for help, and 
not by our own merits ; that when we have 



IMPRESSIONS OF DESPONDENCY. 23 

done well it is through the grace of God, 
which we have not merited, and that, in 
every circumstance, this mercy is ever 
ready to dispense to us the necessary 
grace. 

When these desponding souls are told 
that they ought, after the example of the 
saints, to put all their confidence in God, 
they will at once answer that it is not sur- 
prising that the saints had confidence in 
God, since they were saints, and served 
God with fidelity : but that they have not 
the same right to feel that perfect confi- 
dence in Him which the saints had. 
They do not perceive that such reasoning 
is contrary to the principles of true 
religion. 

Hope is a theological virtue, and its 
motive can be found only in God. These 
souls make it a human virtue when its 
source or motive is recognized in man or 



24 IMPRESSIONS OF DESPONDENCY. 

in his ways. The saints did not hope in 
God because they were faithful to God, 
but they were faithful to God because they 
hoped in Him. Otherwise the sinner 
could never make an act of hope, and yet 
it is that very act of hope which disposes 
him to return to God. 

Observe that St. Paul does not say, I 
have obtained mercy because I have been 
faithful, but "Having obtained mercy of 
the Lord, to be faithful" (i Cor. vii. 25). 
Mercy always precedes the good which 
we do ; and it is from mercy alone that we 
have the necessary grace to do any good 
at all. The saints never counted upon 
their works to strengthen their confidence 
in God, for they were ever mindful of the 
words of Our Saviour: " So you also, when 
you shall have done all these things that 
are commanded you, say: We are un- 
profitable servants" (Luke xvii. 10). The 



IMPRESSIONS OF DESPONDENCY. 25 

greater saints they were, the greater was 
their humility. Their humility allowed 
them to see only the perfection to which 
they had not yet reached. Unlike the 
Pharisee in the Gospel, they found nothing 
in themselves to warrant their confidence, 
but in the mercy of God they sought and 
found a confidence, the foundations of 
which could not be shaken. This was 
what supported them, and this it is which 
must encourage you, and reanimate your 
fainting strength. It is of the utmost im- 
portance for you to understand this truth, 
that you may not again fall into the snare 
which your enemy has so often laid for 
you. 



z6 MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE. 



CHAPTER IV. 

OF THE TRUE MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE — 
THIS MOTIVE IS THE SAME FOR ALL MEN. 

According to religion the motive of 
Christian hope, or of confidence in God, 
is the same for all men, saints and sinners. 

Hope, as we have already said, is a 
theological virtue, like faith and charity. 
Its motive, then, can be found only in 
God, and can rest only upon divine per- 
fection. It follows, therefore, that we 
exclude from this motive our own merits. 
We do not hope in God because we have 
been faithful to Him, but we hope in Him 
that we may obtain the grace to be faith- 
ful. 

On what, then, is Christian hope 
founded, and what is its motive, accord- 
ing to religion? Pope Benedict XIV., 



MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE. 27 

in his form of the Act of Hope, has 
pointed out the divine perfections which 
constitute this motive. The act is this: 
11 O my God, I hope in Thee, because Thou 
art faithful to Thy all-powerful promises, 
and because Thy mercies are infinite? In 
this motive there is nothing human — all 
is drawn from God Himself. And could 
there be a stronger motive to strengthen 
us in hope and confidence in God? We 
here find the mercy of God, who is more 
anxious to shower His gifts upon man 
than man is to receive them ; who desires 
their real good and their salvation much 
more sincerely than they desire it them- 
selves, since He restrains them by His 
grace, which of themselves they could 
not merit, and since He prepares for 
them aid proportionate to the trials to 
which He exposes them — an aid which 
they can obtain by prayer, and with it 



28 MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE. 

conquer the evil one. This mercy is so 
infinite, that all the malice of mankind 
cannot exhaust it ; and, after having mani- 
fested itself so wonderfully in the gift 
which God has granted us, His only Son 
for our ransom, it will not refuse us the 
assistance which He desires to afford us 
in this priceless benefit. 

The effects of this divine mercy have 
been promised to us by the assurances 
which God has made us, of coming to 
our assistance, whenever we ask it, to 
work out our salvation. God, who is 
truth itself, cannot deceive us, and He is 
essentially faithful to the promises He 
makes His creatures. But we find in 
the Holy Scripture the most touching 
exhortations to have recourse to Him in 
our necessities, with the promise that 
He will be our support and our strength. 
How, then, can we have any anxiety or 



MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE. 29 

seriously entertain any fear that He will 
reject or abandon us, when we call upon 
Him with confidence? Would not this 
be accusing God of not keeping His 
promise ? But that would be blasphemy. 
It is true that to grant our prayer God 
requires that we should call upon Him 
with confidence — but should we deserve 
to obtain His benefits if we asked them 
with a doubting heart ; doubting that very 
goodness of which we are experiencing 
the effect every instant of our lives, and 
in so many thousand ways? No, as the 
apostle, St. James, says, "Let him ask 
in faith, nothing wavering" (i. 6). The 
heart that prays with doubt and distrust 
shall obtain nothing. And we also know 
that Jesus Christ whilst on earth granted 
miracles only when there was confidence : 
"Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole " 
(Matt. ix. 22). God's almighty power 



3 o MOTIVE FOR CHRISTIAN HOPE. 

gives the crowning strength to this mo- 
tive for Christian hope, seeing that He 
exceeds all that we can require of Him. 
Men often promise what they are unable 
to give, but it is not thus with the all- 
powerful God. We can find no insur- 
mountable obstacles to His will, in the 
gifts which He desires to make to us. 
He has in the boundless treasury of His 
graces, infallible means to lead us to 
holiness. Therefore we ought never to 
fear asking Him too much, or asking 
things too difficult. 

God being infinitely rich, possesses all 
good, in the order of grace as in the 
order of nature. Being infinitely power- 
ful, there are none of these treasures of 
which He cannot make us partake. Be- 
ing infinitely good, He is disposed to 
grant us, according to His promises, all 
that is necessary for our salvation. It 



MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 31 

is on these substantial motives, drawn 
from the perfections of God, that we 
should found our hope — and only thus 
can our confidence have that unshaken 
firmness which it ought to have. 



CHAPTER V. 

A POWERFUL MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE IS THE 
INFINITE VALUE OF THE SUFFERINGS AND 
MERITS OF JESUS CHRIST. 

A soul that is addicted to despondency 
is swayed by fear, which prevents it from 
reflecting on the immovable foundations of 
confidence in God. We cannot therefore 
give her too many motives for overcom- 
ing that fear which harasses her inces- 
santly. She will find a powerful one in 
the sufferings of Jesus Christ, which are 
as immense as the dignity of His person 



32 MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 

is infinite. This divine Saviour, dying for 
all mankind, praying for all, offering for 
all His sufferings and His death, has mer- 
ited for them all the graces which are nec- 
essary for them to overcome their spiritual 
enemy and to gain eternal happiness. 
These merits which Jesus Christ did not 
need for Himself He has given over to 
mankind. So that, according to St. Bern- 
ard, these merits become our own. And 
by offering them to the Father, we obtain 
that help which we need to strengthen us 
against the enemies of our salvation. It 
is from this principle that the Church, in 
all the prayers she makes to God, always 
invokes the merits of Jesus Christ our 
Lord. 

" But," exclaims a soul, frightened at the 
thought of her many past offences, " how 
must Our Lord and Saviour look upon me, 
after the many outrages which I have 



MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 33 

committed against Him! Can He any 
longer interest Himself for one who has 
been so long His enemy?" Can a well- 
instructed Christian soul have any doubt 
on this point? Did not Jesus Christ 
Himself assure us that He came into the 
world to suffer and die for sinners ; that 
He came chiefly to seek for sinners ? 
Now, in the face of this assertion, will 
they still imagine that, because they are 
sinners, they will be refused the help they 
require to return to God? No, heaven 
and earth may pass away, but the promises 
of God shall not pass away unfulfilled. 
These promises relate to sinners, and if 
there had been no sinners, would Jesus 
Christ have suffered? Would He have 
submitted to a cruel death ? The more 
sinful man is, the more strikingly are the 
mercy of God, and the power of the Sav- 
iour's merits displayed. Is there any 



34 MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 

blacker crime than the treachery of Judas? 
Yes, answers St. Jerome, there is one still 
more enormous, despair ! Judas rendered 
himself more guilty in taking away his 
own life than in betraying his divine 
Master. 

Let us then never fear to have recourse 
to the merits of Jesus Christ. We honor 
them when we make use of them to obtain 
the helps which we need, since it was for 
this that Jesus Christ vouchsafed to 
acquire them and to give them over to 
us. It is in applying them to ourselves 
through prayer and good works, that we 
fulfil the end for which they were pur- 
chased. 

It would be a singular way of honoring 
them, the not daring to make use of them; 
it would be going directly against the end 
which our divine Saviour proposed to 
Himself. In turning from His gifts as 



MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 3; 

useless, we should not be evincing our 
esteem for them, but only proving our 
indifference. 

Since we acknowledge that we are poor, 
weak, and miserable, should we not seek 
to enrich and to strengthen ourselves, and 
to cure our evils? Jesus Christ offers 
Himself to accomplish these miracles in 
us, by offering His infinite merits. With 
loving tenderness He says to us, " Come 
to me, all you that labor, and are bur- 
dened, and I will refresh you " (Matt. xi. 
28). Is it not therefore against every 
principle, against every feeling, and still 
more against the intention of the Saviour 
Himself to fear to have recourse to Him ? 

Temptation attacks the soul in every 
way. Through a sentiment of false humil- 
ity a fear is conceived which fills the soul 
with dejection. Christian humility and 
sound reason require that we should rec-. 



36 MOTIVE FOR CONFIDENCE. 

ognize our unworthiness of heavenly 
benefits; but they do not require us to 
refuse those which are offered, or not to 
ask for those that have been promised 
to our prayers. Still more does the grati- 
tude which we owe to Jesus Christ require 
that we should obey His will, in profiting 
by His sufferings, to obtain the graces 
which He has earned for us. Never can 
we honor Him more than in correspond- 
ing to the merciful designs which He had 
in immolating Himself for us. 

On what could we rely to appease the 
justice of God outraged by sin, and to 
draw down His mercy, if not upon the 
merits of Our Saviour? It is in present- 
ing them to God that we may hope to dis- 
arm His anger. Just as He can see in us 
only that which must provoke His justice, 
so in His Son He only sees what solicits 
His mercy. This divine mercy is exercised 



FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 37 

in our behalf as soon as we, with senti- 
ments of regret, present ourselves to Him, 
under the shadow of the Saviour's cross, 
and covered with His precious blood. 
And thus also is justice appeased. Mercy 
and truth, justice and peace make together 
a blessed treaty for us. In the language 
of the Psalmist, "Mercy and truth have 
met each other: justice and peace have 
kissed" (Ps. lxxxiv. 11). 



CHAPTER VI. 

MOTIVE OF CONFIDENCE FOR THE RELIGIOUS 
SOUL IN THE MERCY WHICH GOD HAS SHOWN 
IN SELECTING HER FOR THE GRACE OF HER VO- 
CATION. FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS WHICH 
WE ASCRIBE TO GOD. 

The religious sees in his vocation a 
strong proof of God's mercy in his regard. 
Even though, after having served God 



3 8 FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 

with fidelity, one may have fallen into a 
state of indifference or into grievous sin, 
if he again seeks to return to God he 
should never doubt of His mercy, and that 
the atoning merits of Our Lord will be ap- 
plied in his behalf. That contrite feeling, 
that holy desire to return to God and to 
the faithful discharge of his duties, does 
it not come from God Himself? That 
strength, that courage to sacrifice the 
goods and pleasures of this world, his evil 
passions and his own will, from whom 
does all this come but from God ? That 
tender devotion, which led him to conse- 
crate himself to God, and sustained him 
in all his conflicts against his natural incli- 
nations, who inspired it but God ? 

If we could be so presumptuous as to 
imagine that we owe this to ourselves, the 
experience of our weakness should alone 
undeceive us, and the words of Our Lord 



FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 39 

condemn us. As He spoke to His apos- 
tles, so does He still speak to every soul 
consecrated to His service, "You have not 
chosen Me: but I have chosen you' (John 
xv. 16), even before you thought of Me, 
whilst you neglected Me, and turned away 
from Me, and obstinately resisted Me ! 
Can God have done so much for us, 
and yet not really wish to aid us when we 
call upon Him for help ? Surely to think 
this would be to accuse God of con- 
tradicting Himself. No; when such a 
soul has recourse to God, He will finish the 
work He has commenced in her, and lead 
her on to the perfection of her state. To 
this He has pledged His word ; and He 
still continues to urge the desponding soul 
lovingly to cast herself upon the bosom of 
His mercy, there to find peace and salva- 
tion. 

It is because we judge God by our own 



4 o FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 

weak human hearts that we fear to ex- 
haust His mercy. If a person to whom 
we have given important assistance, whom 
we have loaded with benefits, treats us with 
ingratitude, and, in return for kindness, 
heaps insults upon us, we turn away from 
him as unworthy of further notice ; more 
especially if he has made use of our very 
benefits to injure us, we abandon him 
forever. We should consider we were 
acting against every dictate of common 
sense and prudence, did we continue to 
furnish him with arms to use against us. 

The same feelings and judgment we 
ascribe to God, forgetting that His ways 
are as far removed from our ways as the 
heavens are from the earth. God bears 
with our wanderings because He is eter- 
nal and all-powerful, and He knows that 
the day of His justice will come, when all 
shall be brought into order, and forever. 



FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 41 

He is patient because He is infinitely good, 
and wishes to give us the means to return 
to Him. He who knows all things has seen 
from all eternity all our weaknesses, our 
ingratitude, and our reiterated falls. He 
has foreseen that we could not do any- 
thing of ourselves, much less return to 
Him without help ; and that help He has 
prepared for us in the person of His Son, 
Jesus. He entreats us, He even com- 
mands us to call upon Him in all our 
wanderings, and He will assist us, He will 
be our propitiation ; for it is in helping us 
and pardoning us that His mercy is exer- 
cised. 

This conduct God evinced in a striking 
manner toward the Jewish nation. When- 
ever they fell into idolatry, God punished 
them, to bring them back to their 
allegiance. When they abandoned their 
Lord to serve strange gods, He would 



42 FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 

deliver them over to their enemies, to 
be held in cruel bondage. Then, when 
bowed down by the miseries of their 
servitude, they lifted up their hearts to 
God and called upon Him with confi- 
dence, God sent them a deliverer to free 
them from the hard yoke under which 
they groaned. And so did they continue 
during a period of four hundred years, 
continually relapsing into idolatry, and as 
often experiencing the mercy of God when 
they called upon Him. 

Judge from this if God will tire in 
pardoning us, if we turn to Him with a 
sincerely contrite heart. But if the con- 
duct of God toward His Jewish people 
does not remove your fears, listen to the 
words of the Prophet- King, inspired by 
the Holy Ghost, who assures us that God 
will not despise " A contrite and humbled 
heart" (Ps. 1. 19). 



FALSE IDEAS AND FEELINGS. 43 

When, terrified by the recollection of 
our sins, we have the thought or the wish 
to return to God, it is He who is then 
attracting us by His grace. Does He call 
us only that He may refuse to receive us ? 
Who can think it? He told St. Peter 
to forgive after every offence, "/ say not 
to thee, till seven times: but till seventy 
times seven" (Matt, xviii. 22), and by this 
we may learn to know His dispositions in 
our regard. Ah! we little know the 
boundless tenderness of that divine Heart, 
if we judge of it by our own, or if we 
imagine that it ever ceases to care for us. 
So long as we are in this life we are under 
the law of mercy, and of that mercy we 
can ever avail ourselves. It is death only 
that places us under the law of immutable 
justice. 



44 LOSING CONFIDENCE. 

CHAPTER VII. 

OUR REPEATED INFIDELITIES OUGHT NOT TO 
MAKE US LOSE CONFIDENCE IN GOD — IT IS 
THE WANT OF FAITH THAT MAKES US FEAR. 

God, who is the tender Father of all His 
creatures, has taken every means to 
remove that excessive fear which would 
draw them from Him. To prevent the 
soul that has become sensible of its in- 
gratitude and terrified at the view of its 
repeated relapses into sin, after so often 
obtaining pardon for them — to prevent 
such a soul from losing all hope and dar- 
ing no longer to cry out to Him from the 
abyss into which it has again fallen, not 
only does He assure it, by the mouth of 
the Psalmist, " That those who hope in 
Him shall never be confounded" but He 
expressly declares the positive law of His 
mercy, and commands us to hope in Him. 



LOSING CONFIDENCE. 45 

This precept we cannot fully accomplish 
but with the help of His grace ; and can 
the Almighty have made this precept and 
not wish to help us keep it? And can 
He fail to be touched by our obedience 
when we endeavor to do so? Can He 
turn away from us, when we call upon 
Him, as He has ordered us to do ? No ; 
God cannot be otherwise than faithful to 
His promises. If we fail, it is because we 
have not asked with confidence, and be- 
cause our faith is weak. 

Let the Holy Scripture here furnish 
you with another proof of this. St. Peter, 
at the order of his divine Master, confi- 
dently walks upon the waters. The wind 
rises, and the apostle's trust lessens; he 
fears, and immediately begins to sink — 
but the danger reanimates his confidence: 
Peter has recourse to his divine Master, 
who stretches forth His hand to save him 



46 LOSING CONFIDENCE. 

from perishing. For our instruction Jesus 
let His apostle know what danger he had 
been in, when He thus reproached him : 
" O thou of little faith, why didst thou 
doubt V" (Matt. xiv. 31.) 

A faithful picture of what too often 
happens to Christian souls! So long as 
all is at peace in our hearts, we proceed 
with confidence toward Jesus. But let 
the winds of temptation arise ; let the dif- 
ficulties of our vocation be felt, we become 
terrified — we forget that we are walking 
at the call of Jesus ; we begin to fear, we 
hesitate in our confidence ; and this first 
infidelity weakens us still further — and 
we begin to sink. If our confidence does 
not reanimate and lead us to ask for help, 
we shall be overwhelmed. 

St. Peter would have perished had he 
not called upon Jesus for help ; and his 
kind Master heard him. If we have 



NEARNESS OF GOD. 47 

imitated the apostle in our weakness, like 
him also let us lose no time in invoking 
the Saviour in our need. We should 
experience His protection, and thus should 
we be spared all those anxieties, and fears, 
and falls, which our want of confidence 
occasions. Help is ever at hand, and ever 
ready for the asking; it is our own fault 
if we do not make use of it 



CHAPTER VIII. 

GOD IS NEVER SO NEAR TO US TO ASSIST US 
IN OUR CONFLICTS AS WHEN WE IMAGINE 
HIM FAR AWAY. HE HIDES HIMSELF ONLY 
THAT WE MAY SEEK HIM AND FIND HIM. 

Sometimes God does not make us wait 
for Him long, and we have a sensible 
feeling of His assistance as soon as we 
call upon Him. Hardly had Peter ex- 



48 NEARNESS OF GOD. 

claimed, " Lord, save me, or I perish ! " 
but the hand of the Saviour was stretched 
forth to save him. At other times our 
divine Lord acts in a more hidden man- 
ner. Sometimes He watches our strug- 
gles without letting His presence be felt, 
but never is He so near to us, so ready 
to help us as soon as we call, as when 
the danger is greatest and most press- 
ing. We become terrified because we 
do not seriously realize Our Saviours 
presence; we think He is afar off, and 
yet He is in our very heart, and it is 
He that is strengthening us. We think 
He is unmindful of our danger, and all 
the time He is watching over our pres- 
ervation, moderating the swelling waves 
of our passions that might cause us to 
sink, saying to them : " Hitherto thou 
shalt come, and thou shalt go no further, 
and here thou shalt break thy swelling 



NEARNESS OF GOD. 49 

waves" (Job xxxviii. 11). Our Saviour, 
who has taught us by His actions as 
well as by His words, gives us upon this 
subject a lesson which is as clear as it 
is consoling. Once as he lay in Peters 
bark it was tossed by a furious storm, 
which seemed to threaten its total wreck. 
He appears to be sleeping, and uncon- 
scious of the danger, but He is all the 
while directing the disciples in the ef- 
forts they are making to save their little 
craft. But the danger and the labor con- 
tinue so long as they forget to have re- 
course to their divine Master, and with 
that confidence which works miracles. 
As soon as they call upon Him, He 
answers, He rises, and commands the 
winds and waves to be still. "And there 
came a great calm" (Matt. viii. 26). How 
often have we not experienced the same 
thing ? When exposed to temptation, 



50 NEARNESS OF GOD. 

which God permits in order to strengthen 
us in humility and vigilance, we see our- 
selves upon the very edge of a precipice, 
into which we look with horror ; we imag- 
ine that we have no longer any strength, 
and that we are on the point of yielding ; 
but notwithstanding the efforts of the 
enemy, we keep up our courage, we re- 
sist, and we continue at the post of duty. 
In that trying situation, what strength 
upheld us ? Surely we will not have 
the presumption to suppose that we have 
resisted by the power or by the strength 
of those resolutions which have so often 
wavered? Oh, no; we must admit that 
it was a celestial power that rescued us 
from shipwreck. Jesus Christ Himself 
was secretly working in our hearts. His 
assistance was not apparent, it was not 
the less real ; the arm that upheld us 
was invisible, it was not the less strong. 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 51 

We know not how we resisted, we only 
know that we have been victorious in 
our combat through the grace of Jesus 
Christ, who has once more reestablished 
in our heart that peace which our temp- 
tation had disturbed. It is on such occa- 
sions that the soul must "Against hope 
believe in hope" (Rom. iv. 18). 



CHAPTER IX. 

WE CANNOT CONQUER WITHOUT FIGHTING — AND 
THERE IS NO FIGHTING WITHOUT TROUBLE. 

The arguments that show the necessity 
for Christian hope are readily admitted; 
but the devil endeavors, by his artful sug- 
gestions, to make the despondent soul 
find pretexts for not applying them to 
herself. Indolence or aversion to every- 
thing that gives trouble is common to all 



52 CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 

men. When we have devoted ourselves 
to God's service, we would like to enjoy 
the happiness of our condition without its 
costing us much, forgetting the words of 
Our Saviour — " The kingdom of heaven 
suffereth violence, and the violent bear it 
away" (Matt. xi. 12). Let us ever re- 
member that Christ did not enter into 
His glory until after He had suffered, and 
that He has admitted His saints to share 
it only after crosses, and combats, and 
sacrifices, the renouncing of their passions 
and their self-will. 

Heaven is a reward; and we can earn 
it only by preferring God and His holy 
will before all other things, and being 
ready to sacrifice whatever is dearest to 
us whenever He requires it. This, then, 
is certain, and St. Paul declares it: "He 
also that striveth for the mastery is not 
crowned except he strive lawfully " (2 Tim. 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 53 

ii. 5). To aspire to the crown of justice 
without fighting is a contradiction to the 
truths of faith — to expect to fight and 
yet not to suffer is contrary to common 
sense. But it is often from the very 
knowledge we have of what God re- 
quires of us, that the devil uses his argu- 
ments for discouraging us, making use 
of our sloth to intimidate us from under- 
taking the necessary labor. It costs us 
nothing to follow our natural inclina- 
tions; it costs us much to repress them, 
and the enemy of our souls never loses 
sight of that, and contrives, readily 
enough, to make us prefer the former. 
Therefore does he set before our eyes 
a lively representation of the difficulties 
we shall undergo in the service of God, 
and that our life will be a constant tor- 
ture and a constant battle. But, on the 
other hand, he carefully conceals the 



54 CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 

peace of heart which we shall find in 
obeying God, the solid consolations we 
shall receive in our trials, the hope of 
our eternal reward. No, the devil will 
show us our weakness to its fullest ex- 
tent, will remind us of our repeated re- 
lapses; but the mercy of God, and the 
support of that all-powerful arm which 
so often upheld us, he will try to make 
us forget. 

Let us now see how we are apt to be- 
have under this species of temptation. 
Entirely absorbed by the thought of our 
weakness, and the difficulties of what we 
have undertaken, we fall into discourage- 
ment, instead of exclaiming with holy king 
David : " Though I should walk in the 
midst of the shadow of death, I will fear 
no evils: for Thou art with me" (Ps. xxii. 
4). In this state of discouragement we 
have but a feeble hope that God will help 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 55 

us ; we hardly expect it, we scarcely dare 
to ask for it; perhaps, even, we fear to 
attain it, lest it should oblige us to relin- 
quish certain favorite inclinations. In 
this condition, despairing of being able to 
persevere in such a life of self-violence, we 
struggle but feebly, if at all. Our first 
relapse serves to confirm this impression 
— that it is useless for us to resist, and 
that we must only wait for the time when 
our passions shall be weaker. 

Henceforward, everything becomes more 
difficult. Disgust and the spirit of indif- 
ference with regard to our duties take 
possession of our mind and heart, and 
these duties are thus rendered only the 
more arduous. Our exercises of piety we 
omit altogether, or acquit ourselves of 
them so carelessly that they can scarcely 
be pleasing to God. A dissipated and 
distracted state of mind and heart succeed 



56 CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 

the interior life which we formerly led. 
We abandon our pious practices, resist 
grace, silence the voice of our con- 
science, and even avoid entertaining good 
thoughts. We follow only the bent of 
our inclinations and caprices, where we 
meet with no resistance. In His mercy 
God may at times speak to us, but we 
have begun to dread the voice that would 
urge us to shake off the bonds of sloth 
and lukewarmness. This is the point to 
which the enemy of our salvation has 
sought to lead us; he wished to prevent 
us from reflection and from working for 
our salvation ; and he has succeeded. 

These details are perhaps lengthy, but 
they may help you to understand the 
enemy's plan of attack, and enable you to 
prepare a defence which shall defeat his 
designs. 

I am quite aware that could we foresee 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 57 

all the difficulties and trials that must be 
encountered in the service of God, taken 
collectively for the space of a long life, we 
might well feel appalled. But is this the 
way in which we are called upon to en- 
counter the trials of a Christian life ? Our 
temptations and trials generally meet us 
separately; to-day we have one enemy to 
combat, to-morrow another, according to 
the occasion. If there are some that 
again and again have to be met and over- 
come, there are others that return but 
seldom. Against the former we must 
guard ourselves in an especial manner; 
against the latter we must prepare our- 
selves by frequent exercise of the love of 
God. It would surely evince great pusil- 
lanimity to be afraid to resist an enemy 
that opposes us singly, and grows strong 
only in proportion as we show ourselves to 
be weak. Tremble at his approach and 



58 CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 

you are overcome; but resist him, invok- 
ing God's assistance, and you are sure to 
conquer. 

Never consider collectively what is to 
be presented to you separately. We have 
only to answer for the present, and there- 
fore to torment one's self about the uncer- 
tain future is folly. Such conduct is 
really going in advance of temptation, or, 
in other words, seeking it; it is laying 
snares for one's own destruction. Why 
should we suffer in imagination that 
which we may never have to suffer in 
reality ? " Sufficient for the day is the 
evil thereof" (Matt. vi. 34). To expose 
one's self to temptation is contrary alike 
to religion and to Christian prudence. 

If, then, a person does violence to him- 
self for the love of God, and in the hope 
of reward — if, at any trial to which he is 
exposed, he occupies himself exclusively 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 59 

with it, and thinks only how he will de- 
rive from it the greatest benefit — he will 
easily undergo them all successively, by 
the grace of Our Lord, and with great 
merit to himself. 

A person in religious life feels a repug- 
nance for the yoke and restraint of obedi- 
ence and regularity. Suppose, instead of 
overcoming himself on each occasion, he 
begins to consider the difficulty of a whole 
life passed in such constraint ; his courage 
sinks at the prospect, and he is ready to 
despair. But let him only look at it as 
the restraint of a day, or half a day, or only 
in connection with the present duty; half 
the difficulty vanishes, and he finds his 
strength is fully equal to it. And, indeed, 
it is frequently but a momentary trial, and 
the trouble ceases when the determination 
is firmly taken. 

Let us rest assured, too, that we are very 



60 CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 

much mistaken, if we think that the diffi- 
culty which we experience in self-mortifi- 
cation, and in performing our duties for 
the love of God, will continue as vivid and 
painful as we find it in the beginning. 
Experience teaches us that, on merely 
natural principles, when we frequently 
perform any action, or through the assist- 
ance of divine grace accustom ourselves 
to act from good motives, we contract a 
habit of doing so which becomes easier 
with every repetition. Whatever diffi- 
culty at first existed gradually diminishes 
and finally disappears. Let us only, for a 
while, do violence to ourselves, and per- 
form our actions with fidelity and exact- 
ness as to time and place, and we shall 
soon find that we do them, as it were, in- 
stinctively, and the religious motive seems 
to present itself of its own accord. So true 
is this that some scrupulous souls are 



CONQUERING AND FIGHTING. 61 

apt to become troubled and wrongly im- 
agine that they have no merit, because 
they no longer feel the sacrifice or the 
suffering in the duty which had cost them 
so much at first. They overlook the fact 
that it is the supernatural motive, under 
the instigation of grace, which gives merit 
to the action, and not its difficulty. 

Religion, moreover, teaches us that God 
rewards the efforts we make to overcome 
ourselves, by imparting graces which not 
only lessen our difficulties, but even cause 
us to derive pleasure from what was at first 
so painful. And even though the trial 
continues for a longer time, He will never 
suffer it to surpass our strength aided by 
the grace which He has provided, and 
which we can always obtain through 
prayer. Rely on this promise, for it can 
never fail. 

Let us never dwell upon the uncertainty 



6z TEMPTING GOD. 

of our perseverance, without also remem- 
bering Gods assurance that He will help 
us and reward us ; this will strengthen us 
and reanimate our confidence. 



CHAPTER X. 

IT IS TEMPTING GOD AND TEMPTING ONE'S SELF 
TO BE SOLICITOUS ABOUT THE CONFLICTS 
THAT MAY AWAIT US. 

Many will say, is it not required of me 
to have the disposition to fulfil all my ob- 
ligations? Yet, when I foresee all that 
they may entail upon me, I do not feel the 
strength to undergo such conflicts for a 
whole lifetime — how is it possible, then, 
not to tremble and to feel discouraged ? 

In the first place, as we have before re- 
marked, these conflicts will not always 
continue with the same power, nor shall 



TEMPTING GOD. 63 

you be so keenly conscious of them ; there- 
fore do not judge of the difficulty of per- 
severing by that which you at present 
experience. Begin with your present help, 
and hope for the same in the time to come. 

Secondly, God forbids us rashly to ex- 
pose ourselves to the occasion of tempta- 
tion. He has not promised His assistance 
to the one who, with distrustful solicitude, 
anticipates in imagination all his possible 
trials and that collectively ; trials which he 
may perhaps not have to undergo, and 
which, should they come at all, will cer- 
tainly never come all at once. To-day 
you may not feel the strength to encounter 
them ; but the hour for the battle has not 
yet struck — there is a grace awaiting you 
for that trial. You have not yet received 
it, and it is no wonder, therefore, that you 
should feel alarmed. 

But why should you thus, contrary to 



64 TEMPTING GOD. 

the will of God, expose yourself to tempta- 
tions ? Why should you seek to sound 
your heart, to find out how you are dis- 
posed in regard to the heavy crosses, the 
violent temptations, and the protracted 
conflicts which others have to endure, and 
which, possibly, may fall to your lot ? God 
has promised His sufficient grace for the 
sacrifices He requires of us, but He has 
not promised His assistance to those who, 
in imagination, place themselves in circum- 
stances that do not exist, and to which, 
possibly, they may never be exposed. 

The truly Christian soul is humble, and 
far from seeking danger, fears and avoids 
it. It is from rashness, from a secret pre- 
sumption and self-love, that you thus seek 
temptation. 

Is it then surprising that you find your 
will weak and irresolute? God's holy 
grace is not dispensed according to our 



TEMPTING GOD. 65 

whims and fancies, but according to our 
real needs, when we submit to the order 
of His providence. 

Let us beware of the temptation that 
deludes imprudent and misguided souls, 
in causing them to dwell upon imaginary 
and future difficulties that may never 
exist, and thus leading them to neglect 
the present efforts and sacrifices which 
God is requiring of them. Losing sight 
of a reality, they follow a shadow. 

The faithful soul who desires to please 
God must not anticipate in her imagina- 
tion painful trials under pretext of testing 
her readiness to accept them. This species 
of foresight, God, far from approving, con- 
demns. It is, in a certain sense, tempting 
divine providence. Though the intention 
that leads to it may appear good, do not 
trust to it, but carefully avoid it. What 
God requires of us is an abiding determi- 



66 TEMPTING GOD. 

nation not only to avoid sin, but its proxi- 
mate occasions, to bear with submission 
the crosses that await us daily, and not to 
invent crosses in order to carry them before 
they are sent. It will be time enough to 
suffer when God permits it, without seek- 
ing to suffer beforehand, a trouble which 
He has not yet given us, and which, per- 
haps, He may never send. These imagi- 
nary evils, rashly taken upon ourselves, 
will be all the harder because God will not 
aid us to bear them. 

If the anticipation of these crosses in- 
trudes itself upon the mind without the 
consent of the will, then raise the heart to 
God, and say, with confidence and with 
love : " If it is Thy will, O my God, that 
these crosses be laid upon me, let me 
hope that, according to Thy promise, and 
through the merits of Jesus Christ, I may 
be assisted to carry them." After this 



THE SERVICE OF GOD. 67 

little prayer banish these dangerous con- 
siderations ; apply yourself to the faithful 
fulfilment of your duties, to mortifying 
yourself when the occasion offers. This 
fidelity will be a much more certain and 
useful proof of your love of God. 



CHAPTER XL 

OF WEARINESS, DISGUST, AND DIFFICULTIES IN 
THE SERVICE OF GOD — CAUSES OF A DIS- 
COURAGEMENT CONTRARY TO REASON. 

The Christian who thinks that all his 
prayers are vain to conquer his ruling 
passion, or to overcome an habitual temp- 
tation, who feels in the service cf God 
only weariness and disgust, becomes per- 
plexed and anxious. The evil one soon 
begins to suggest to him that God does 
not hear him, that his prayers are useless, 



68 THE SERVICE OF GOD. 

and thus leads him to the very brink of 
discouragement, seeing in God only a 
hard and angry master, whom he no 
longer hopes to be able to please. What 
deceives such a person (whom God has 
not abandoned, but permits to be tried) 
is, that as he serves God with disgust, 
with languor, and with dryness of heart, 
he presumes that his service is neither 
pleasing to God, nor meritorious to him- 
self. This thought at first depresses 
and soon discourages him altogether, un- 
less the Lord vouchsafe to grant him a 
return of that spiritual sweetness which 
he once enjoyed, and still continues to 
ask for. Such a person must be reminded 
of the truths of religion, which will reani- 
mate his confidence and prove to him 
that his fears were groundless. 

That weariness, those repugnances and 
disgusts which are often accompanied by 



THE SERVICE OF GOD. 69 

other temptations, are not in themselves 
sins — they are not even imperfections; 
how, then, can they detract from the merit 
of our actions or prevent their being pleas- 
ing to God ? Man cannot know the in- 
terior, and consequently judges of the 
merit and excellence of an action by out- 
ward appearances of zeal ; so that, in his 
eyes, the manner in which the action is 
performed greatly augments or diminishes 
its value. But it is not thus with God — 
He reads the heart, and judges of the 
sincerity of our intentions in themselves, 
and without regard to exterior forms. To 
please God it suffices to be obedient to 
His holy will. 

This truth is undeniable; we have for 
its support the word and example of Jesus 
Christ Himself. Our divine Lord, teach- 
ing His disciples, says : " He that doth the 
will of My Father who is in heaven, he 



70 THE SERVICE OF GOD. 

shall enter into the kingdom of heaven " 
(Matt. vii. 21). He does not say that we 
must do it with pleasure, or from a sensi- 
ble attraction ; He only requires us to do it, 
no matter what the difficulty may be, and 
it is for this that He promises us salva- 
tion. If that state of disgust and weari- 
ness does not prevent the Christian soul 
from properly performing the duties that 
God requires of her, it follows that it is 
not an obstacle to sanctification and 
salvation. 

Our divine Saviour confirms His teach- 
ing by His example. Though incapable, 
not only of sin, but even of the slightest 
imperfection, He chose, nevertheless, to 
undergo the same trials to which He 
subjects His creatures. In the desert 
He permitted the evil spirit to tempt 
Him by suggestions of vanity, of worldly 
honors, and of presumptuous confidence. 



THE SERVICE OF GOD. 71 

In the garden of Olives, at the prospect 
of the sufferings that awaited Him, and 
of the ingratitude of mankind, He under- 
went a most oppressive desolation of 
heart, profound sadness, and intense dis- 
gust. But as these temptations and feel- 
ings did not change His fidelity and 
submission to the will of the Father, in 
that state of suffering and desolation, He 
was not less the object of the admiration 
of heaven and of the complacency of 
the eternal Father. 

It is therefore certain that the state 
of temptation, of desolation, of repugnance 
and weariness, which the soul may experi- 
ence, however great it may be, is not a 
sin in itself; that these involuntary feel- 
ings are not even imperfections, and the 
duties performed whilst in that state are 
none the less pleasing to God and meri- 
torious for salvation. 



72 THE SERVICE OF GOD. 

I cannot too much insist upon this 
truth; for I am conscious that there are 
many who, notwithstanding the words 
and example of Jesus Christ, are always 
troubled by what they experience in 
this state of dryness and desolation — 
they have read that they must serve 
the Lord with gladness, and as soon as 
they cease to experience this feeling, 
which Jesus Christ does not require of 
them, and which does not depend upon 
them but only upon God as we shall 
elsewhere show, they begin to tremble 
and fear that they are separated from 
God ; and even that they are already 
rejected by Him. 

Let us reason still further upon this. 
As long as you do not yield to these 
temptations, to this dryness and disgust, 
you endure them against your will, they 
do not depend upon you. If they de- 



THE SERVICE OF GOD. 73 

pended upon you, you certainly would 
not permit them, since they make you 
suffer so much. Now, it is clear that 
feelings that do not depend upon you, 
and that you do not wilfully entertain, 
which you even struggle against, cannot 
render you guilty before God. You are 
only responsible before God for that which 
depends upon yourself, to do or not to do, 
and is the free choice of your will. 

This is a truth upon which the Church 
has decided, and which cannot therefore 
be doubted; it is a truth which reason 
herself teaches. How could we recon- 
cile our belief of the justice and good- 
ness of the Almighty with the idea that 
He would punish us for that which we 
could not avoid ? It is positive, therefore, 
that a state of dryness has nothing in 
itself that can render the soul displeas- 
ing to God. 



74 THE SERVICE OF GOD. 

We must further add, for the consola- 
tion of tempted and discouraged souls, 
that if, in this state, they do not relax from 
the faithful discharge of their duties, they 
are really evincing to the Almighty a more 
fervent love, they obtain from Him a 
more convincing proof of His protection, 
and they receive more merit for their 
actions, than when, sustained by more 
sensible consolations, they experience little 
or no difficulty. It cannot be doubted 
that the more enemies there are to be 
conquered and difficulties to be sur- 
mounted, to accomplish the will of God, 
the more must such a soul be strengthened 
by divine love. If its love were weak it 
could not resist the evil powers that 
combine to overthrow it. The fidelity of 
the soul in that state exhibits the mercy 
of God in its regard, in the strength of 
His grace, by which it is sustained, — a 



THE SERVICE OF GOD. 75 

grace not the less powerful and merito- 
rious in that it is not sensibly felt. 

In these conflicts, which are frequently 
long and obstinate, we may commit some 
faults — it is the lot of human nature — but 
let them not cause alarm, for they are 
repaired by the sacrifices which we are 
constantly offering to God. If, then, we 
bear this cross with submission ; if we 
constantly deny ourselves, to follow in the 
spirit of faith the light which we have 
received, can we fear we shall be rejected 
from among the followers of Jesus ? Has 
not that divine Saviour said that to follow 
Him " We must deny ourselves, and take up 
our cross" (Matt. xvi. 24)? This is what 
is done when we persevere notwithstand- 
ing our aridity, weariness, and disgust. 
Can we think God will permit so many 
sacrifices to go unrewarded? No, the 
Apostle says : " God is not unjust, that He 



j6 FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 

should forget your work and the love which 
you have shoivn in His name" (Heb. vi. 
10). Be faithful, then, your reward is at 
hand. God's word can never fail. A few 
days of light labor, and then — eternity! an 
eternity of ineffable happiness — and a hap- 
piness which generally begins even in this 
life, by the graces of consolation and 
peace which God sends to the soul He 
has previously tried. Such is the lot 
awarded to you. The saints have shared 
it with you. 



CHAPTER XII. 

IT IS NOT WELL TO ASK GOD TO PUT AN END 
TO OUR TRIALS AND DIFFICULTIES, AND TO 
DESIRE THE IMMEDIATE FULFILMENT OF OUR 
PRAYERS. 

Notwithstanding the truths we have 
just laid down, it must be admitted that 



FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 77 

this state of aridity and disgust is always 
hard to bear. Man naturally abhors dif- 
ficulties and trials. Instead of being- 
occupied with the advantages accruing 
from these conflicts, he is mindful only of 
the efforts they cost, and turns to God for 
assistance. But what is his prayer? It 
is that God should put an end to this 
state of anxiety, weariness, and disgust. 
If the Almighty does not grant it, but 
wishes to try him further, he imagines that 
he prays in vain, that God does not hear 
him, that he does not obtain the assist- 
ance which he implores. Trouble, fear, 
and discouragement take entire possession 
of him. In this state he does not know 
what to ask of God; he scarcely dares to 
address Him. While he exclaims with 
the Saviour: " My Father, if it be possible, 
let this chalice pass from me;" he has 
not the courage to add, "nevertheless not 



78 FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 

as I will, but as Thou wilt" (Matt. xxvi. 
39). It requires a lively faith and ardent 
love thus to cast one's self into the arms 
of divine providence, which, nevertheless, 
guards us with a care that is proportioned 
to the perfection of our confidence. 

Religion teaches us that God, in His 
dealings with His creatures, can only have 
in view His own glory and their ultimate 
sanctification. It belongs, therefore, to 
God alone to decide in what way He 
chooses to be glorified by our service, and 
by what path He chooses to lead us to 
our sanctification and happiness. Shall 
the creature presume to serve the Creator 
according to his own ideas and peculiar 
predilections — prescribe to Him the man- 
ner in which he wishes to be led by His 
providence, and determine the conditions 
on which He must assign His rewards ? 
The very idea is an extravagant delusion ; 



FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 79 

for it would be leaving us to be guided by 
our own passions and prejudices. 

Man's position, therefore, with regard to 
God, must be that of an humble and entire 
submission. His first care must be to 
seek to know what God requires of him, 
and then to follow in the path He points 
out, with confidence, with love and 
docility. God must trace the plan; it is 
for man to execute it with the help of 
God's grace. If he enters the path with 
the proper dispositions, it will be the 
safest one for him, because God, in select- 
ing it for his sanctification, has prepared 
especial graces to guide and strengthen 
him therein. Whenever we are thus in 
the state which providence has designed 
for us, we may always expect this especial 
protection. 

If God chooses to lead a soul to heaven 
through the path of dryness and desolation, 



80 FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 

may it pray that the will of providence 
be changed in its behalf ? It may, for 
even Christ did the same ; and the prayer 
is often granted. A delay in granting a 
petition is not a refusal; perseverance 
may obtain it from God, when the time to 
show us His mercy has come. But we 
should never make this the single object 
of our prayers, so as to become disheart- 
ened should it be refused. In so doing, 
we should not follow the example given by 
Our Saviour, and imitated by His saints ; 
but rather the suggestions of the tempter, 
who seeks to turn us from God, and the 
path His providence has marked out for 
us. 

The first and chief object of our prayers 
should be to ask of God submission to His 
holy will, and grace to fulfil with resigna- 
tion, with fidelity, and with love, the duties 
of the state in which He has placed us 



FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 81 

for our sanctification, for He and not our- 
selves has chosen that state. But let this 
prayer be made with the humble convic- 
tion that we deserve no favors from God, 
and that having had the misfortune to 
offend Him, it is only through His mercy 
that He continues to bear with us; and 
that, like the prodigal son, we should not 
expect to be treated as His children, but 
like the meanest of His servants, bearing 
with the trials of our state in the spirit of 
penance, and abandoning ourselves to His 
providence to suffer as long as He is 
glorified by our sufferings. This is the 
best means we can adopt to obtain from 
God a deliverance from our painful trials. 

You think God does not hear you 
because He leaves you in the state of 
aridity and temptation, from which you 
have prayed to be delivered ! This is not 
according to the teachings of religion. If 



82 FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 

your prayer is made with confidence, with 
submission, and with perseverance, it will 
certainly be heard ; Christ Himself has 
promised it. God may not grant the par- 
ticular favor you ask for; He may see 
that it would be prejudicial to you, or less 
useful than other gifts which He intends 
to confer upon you. Instead of the favor 
which you seek, but which His mercy 
withholds, He will give you graces that are 
more precious and more desirable, and 
that will enable you to practise the higher 
virtues of religion ; graces that will enable 
you to merit heaven, by self-denial, morti- 
fication, submission, the spirit of penance ; 
graces that will support you in your 
conflicts, and that will teach you your 
nothingness, convince you of your weak- 
ness, preserve you in Christian humility, 
the foundation of all true virtue, in watch- 
fulness over yourself, and in union with 



FULFILMENT OF OUR PRAYERS. 83 

God to solicit His help, the need of which 
you will more and more estimate. 

This disposition of providence is clearly 
pointed out to us by St. Paul. That great 
apostle frequently entreated the Lord to 
deliver him from a humiliating temptation 
which tormented him ; but God permitted 
this temptation, lest, as the apostle him- 
self relates, " The greatness of the revela- 
tions should exalt me" (2 Cor. xii. 7). 
God refused to deliver him from his temp- 
tation, but assured him of His help. " My 
grace is sufficient for thee" (2 Cor. xii. 9). 
Therefore the refusal to grant the prayer 
of one who has been long tempted and 
troubled, does not argue that God has 
turned from him and abandoned him. It 
only proves that God's designs over him 
are not according to his views, and that 
though He does not deliver him, He is 
ever ready to help him. 



84 THE COST OF VICTORY. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

WE WOULD WISH THE ALMIGHTY TO DO ALL 
FOR US, AND TO GIVE US THE VICTORY 
WITHOUT ITS COSTING US ANYTHING: A PER- 
NICIOUS ERROR, AN UNFAIR REQUEST, AND A 
COMMON CAUSE OF DISCOURAGEMENT. 

" I should be satisfied," say some of 
those who complain that their petitions 
are not granted, "if I experienced the 
effects of this merciful providence, but I 
do not see that God helps me to be more 
faithful to my duties." To throw light 
upon this difficulty, let us consult the 
truths of religion which ought to direct 
our judgments. Let us walk in the light 
of faith, which should illumine us; we 
shall be able to prove that if you are not 
more faithful to your duties, it is not 
because God's grace is wanting, but that 
you are wanting toward God, 



THE COST OF VICTORY. 85 

According to religion, God will not 
work out our salvation without our own 
concurrence. He created us without our 
own cooperation, but He will not save us 
without it. He requires that our prefer- 
ence for Him be the choice of our own 
free will. He has therefore put before 
us good and evil, life and death ; and He 
has said, " Choose which you will." To in- 
cline us to good, He gives us light to see 
the motives for it; love, gratitude, and 
future reward. He excites in us many 
feelings which cause us to love what is 
good, and to desire it. He thus forestalls 
us by His grace, and gives us aid in the 
hour of need. This is what God has prom- 
ised us, and this He does. To corre- 
spond to all this, we must not lose sight of 
those motives and those feelings (which 
we too often do), but we must be imbued 
with them, we must ponder them, and be 



86 THE COST OF VICTORY. 

engrossed with them, and, docile to the 
voice of the Holy Spirit, we must deny 
ourselves to follow His inspirations, for 
otherwise we cannot do good, and obtain 
heaven. 

Would you have reason to complain of 
a friend who had given you wholesome 
advice to avoid ^n evil, but to whom you 
did not choose to listen because to follow 
his advice would have entailed some little 
trouble upon you? Would it not justly 
be said of you that you had suffered 
through your own fault? And yet this 
is what we daily witness. How frequently, 
fearing the labor we encounter in fighting 
against our evil inclinations, we ask God 
to free us from them, but it would seem 
that the conditions are that He is to do 
all and it is to cost us nothing. We as- 
pire to the miracle performed for a St. 
Paul. It seems as though we said : " If 



THE COST OF VICTORY. 87 

this inclination be displeasing to God, why 
does He not deliver me from it? Is He 
not able to do so ? Why does He not 
change the feelings of my heart ? He has 
changed others in a moment." Waiting 
for this miracle to be performed in our 
favor, we, meanwhile, do nothing ourselves, 
and do not heed the voice of God 
whispering to our soul. Such dispositions, 
as you must see, are not apt to draw down 
upon us the mercy of God. 

Whosoever expects to serve God with- 
out doing violence to himself, contradicts 
the words of Jesus Christ. Whosoever 
expects miracles to be performed in his 
favor does not deserve to be heard at 
all. 

Others, again, are free from such fool- 
ish presumption, and are kept back in 
the path of virtue from their over-anxiety 
about their difficulties, and from their 



88 THE COST OF VICTORY. 

deep conviction that they can in nothing 
obtain merit ; their whole mind is ab- 
sorbed by this, and their only petition to 
God is to change their state. They hesi- 
tate to follow the lights and pious inclina- 
tions which God gives them, because not 
finding in themselves the particular graces 
which they are bent upon obtaining, and 
which they persist in asking for, they fear 
they are deceived. Thus the graces which 
they do receive are rendered useless to 
them, either by their inattention to them, 
or by their opposition. Did they only 
profit by those graces, although not such 
as they asked for, they would soon obtain 
what they desire, but which they cannot 
expect so long as they resist God. 

Let us study the providence of God 
and the economy of His grace, and we 
shall clearly discern the snare of the 
tempter, who, joining error to a want of 



EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 89 

fidelity, causes the soul to fall into dis- 
couragement. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

DISCOURAGEMENT OCCURS BECAUSE WE WILL 
NOT PROFIT BY THE ORDINARY AID WHICH IS 
WITHIN OUR REACH, BUT THROUGH A SLOTH- 
FUL FEELING, WAIT FOR EXTRAORDINARY 
GRACES. 

It is always from want of instruction, 
or from inattention to that which we 
have received, that we are led to form 
unreasonable expectations. God's provi- 
dence in regard to man is of two kinds : 
The first is extraordinary and miraculous, 
in which He displays the wonders of His 
power. The second is common and ordi- 
nary, in which He acts, as our reason can 
perceive, by means proportionate to the 
end which His wisdom proposes. The 



9 o EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 

first is rare and passing. God employs 
it only for some especial design, but man, 
to whom these motives are unknown, 
would be tempting God were he to 
count on receiving it. 

There is no doubt that the Almighty 
can perform miracles, but He has prom- 
ised them to no one. Therefore have 
we no reasonable right to expect them, 
either to help us in our wants or to guide 
us in our actions. If a man should re- 
frain from making any effort to obtain 
the necessaries of life with the pretext 
that God can, and does, at times, perform 
miracles, he would surely be looked upon 
as a madman. And is it less contrary 
to all the established principles of the 
Gospel, to count upon a daily miracle in 
the order of grace for the life of the 
soul ? 

The second kind of providence is gen- 



EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 91 

eral, ordinary, and constant for all men. 
If the Almighty has at times made use 
of the first, with regard to some, in chang- 
ing them all at once, He has afterward 
made them return to the common order, 
and treated them as the rest of mankind. 
Witness St. Paul, who, after being raised 
to the third heaven, " brought his body 
into subjection, lest, perhaps, he should be- 
come a castaway" (1 Cor. ix. 27). 

The common and ordinary providence 
of God leads us to the acquiring of 
virtue, and to a knowledge of the means 
which reason teaches us are necessary to 
succeed in our undertaking ; and to em- 
ploy them with the aid of religion, to 
the end for which man was created — 
God, and the happiness of possessing 
Him. 

If we wish to succeed in any art or 
science, that desire naturally leads us to 



92 EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 

study its first principles with assiduity, 
and to engrave them so profoundly in 
our minds that they may be always pres- 
ent to us, whenever we engage in that 
occupation or study in which we seek 
to perfect ourselves. We carefully avoid 
proceeding contrary to those principles, 
and should we fall into some mistake, 
instead of being discouraged, we redouble 
our efforts to repair it as soon as pos- 
sible. Look at the men who wish to 
succeed in their particular line — the art- 
ist, the professor, the magistrate ; you will 
find them all following the same path 
— resisting the wearisomeness of the first 
steps which are always tedious and re- 
pugnant, putting themselves to incon- 
veniences, and overcoming the greatest 
difficulties. Such is the conduct of sen- 
sible men in all the affairs of life. They 
are incessantly occupied with them, and 



EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 93 

spare neither care nor trouble to succeed 
in them. Reason teaches the same truth 
to them all, and success justifies the wis- 
dom of the means employed. 

Such is also the ordinary providence 
of God for those who labor in the prac- 
tice of virtue, and in the great affair of 
salvation — the means of success is the 
same; only the motives and the end are 
different. In the affairs of life it is some 
earthly and perishable good that we seek, 
and human motives impel us. In reli- 
gion, the good we seek is celestial and 
eternal, and our motives are superhuman. 
It is God who inspires the desire, and 
it is His grace that assists our efforts. 

God, then, wills us to desire the pos- 
session of eternal happiness; to strive for 
it, as for the essential end of our being; 
to perform those good works which may 
insure its attainment; to avoid carefully 



94 EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 

whatever may forfeit or endanger it. In 
short, He wishes us, in accordance with 
the dictates of true reason, supported by 
religious motives, to spare neither trouble, 
nor pain, nor any heavenly means at our 
command, to succeed in this pursuit. 
Eternity is here at stake. 

The Almighty has chosen this order 
of providence in preference to any 
other which He might have determined, 
because He is the author of nature as 
well as of grace. He wished, thereby, 
to commit man to the necessity of work- 
ing for his final happiness instead of re- 
signing himself to a spiritual indolence 
in which, not cooperating with God, he 
would but feebly desire or esteem a 
benefit that he would expect solely from 
Him. He wished to leave man without 
excuse if he failed to do for an eternal 
good what he daily does for perishable 



EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 



95 



ends, for a passing pleasure, and if he 
neglected the dictates of reason in that 
where it most concerned him to follow 
them. 

It is thus that God, in His all- wise 
and merciful providence, instead of mak- 
ing an open manifestation of His power, 
offers His divine grace to His creatures, 
to lead them in the path of faith, hope, 
and love. Those lights, those feelings 
and desires, teaching you what God re- 
quires of you and leading you to accom- 
plish that will, come not from yourself, 
but from God. He is the author of 
them, and it is He who suggests them 
to you, and the means whereby to ele- 
vate them, in order that they may attain 
their end, which is your eternal salva- 
tion. To refuse, therefore, these lights 
and inspirations, because they are not 
what we ask of God, or for any other 



96 EXTRAORDINARY GRACES 

reason whatsoever, is to try to change 
the appointed order of His providence, 
and to reach heaven by a path different 
from the one He has marked out for us. 

What then must one do when tempted 
to discouragement? Acting on the prin- 
ciple that we should not willingly lose a 
present good because we cannot obtain 
another which we covet, until God once 
more visits us with consolations, we 
should submit ourselves to His holy 
will, follow with docility the graces which 
we receive, and avail ourselves with grati- 
tude of the light which is accorded to 
us. We shall then always find, in the 
common and ordinary path of divine 
providence, all that we need to sustain 
us in the practice of virtue. 

What justifies this principle of com- 
mon prudence, and consecrates it in reli- 
gious life, is that to follow this order of 



EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 97 

providence, from which we should never 
swerve, it is not sufficient to avoid gross 
faults, if we neglect at the same time, 
omit, or negligently practise, the virtue 
which God asks of us, in the graces 
which He accords. The foolish virgins 
were excluded from the marriage feast 
because they were not found ready when 
the bridegroom was announced (Matt, 
xxv). The slothful servant was con- 
demned because he had not profited by 
the talent his master had intrusted to 
him. That talent is time, which God 
gives us ; it is grace, which we so often 
receive, and of which we too often avail 
ourselves as little as of the time which 
we so carelessly squander. These strik- 
ing examples should make a slothful and 
tepid person enter into himself, and adher- 
ing to the order of providence designed 
for him, endeavor to profit by the light 



98 EXTRAORDINARY GRACES. 

and grace which are given for his sancti- 
fication. 

Do not look upon this as mere human 
reasoning. It is what Christ teaches in 
His Gospel, where He recommends vigi- 
lance and prayer, the renunciation of 
desires that are contrary to the will o£ 
God, care to avoid evil and to flee from 
temptation. Hence, those saints and 
Fathers of the Church, who, enlightened 
by the Spirit of God, have given rules 
for conducting souls to perfection, do 
not prescribe anything extraordinary. 
They are content to point out ordinary 
means, frequent prayer, spiritual reading, 
repeated examination of the conscience to 
ascertain and correct our faults, silence, 
which favors our union with God and 
prevents dissipation, so fatal to the one 
whom it withdraws from God, that, 
neglecting Him, he may follow, as his 



ON RESISTANCE. 99 

only guide, his evil desires and inclina- 
tions. 

The more you examine these means, 
the more shall you find them conform- 
able, not only to the Gospel, but to 
reason. No matter how great may be 
our dryness, weariness, disgust, and temp- 
tations, we can always make use of 
these means, which God will always 
strengthen by His grace, if we have 
recourse to Him with confidence. 



CHAPTER XV. 

IT IS FALSE AND DANGEROUS TO THINK THAT 
WE CAN DO NOTHING TO RESIST CERTAIN IN- 
CLINATIONS AND HABITS WHICH OVERCOME US. 

One of the illusions by which the 
devil casts some souls into despondency, 
or confirms them therein, is this, that 



ioo ON RESISTANCE. 

certain of their inclinations and habits are 
so strongly rooted that they cannot over- 
come them. If you propose remedies for 
their correction, they will be so reluctant 
to adopt them as to declare that it is 
out of their power, that it is utterly use- 
less to make the attempt. Whilst in 
this disposition the lights and inspira- 
tions sent to them from heaven are 
rendered of no avail by their negligence 
or their resistance. 

This is the excuse, but the real truth 
is, that they are unwilling to employ 
that violence against themselves which 
is necessary for their amendment. They 
do not ask of God the grace which they 
require with a sincere desire of receiv- 
ing it. They never go to the source of 
their difficulties in order to apply the 
remedy which reason and religion pre- 
scribe. They seek to quiet their con- 



ON RESISTANCE. 101 

science by the assurance that they can 
do nothing to help themselves, and they 
indulge their inclination in a security 
that is highly prejudicial. At times, 
alarmed by their dangerous condition, 
they take a spasmodic resolution of re- 
turning to God, but because they do 
not go to the root of the evil, arfd are 
averse to all painful exertion, they quickly 
tire of struggling against temptations, 
which continually beset them, and, at 
the first failure, resign themselves again 
to the conclusion that it is beyond their 
strength. Despondency once more gains 
possession, and they abandon even the 
wish to strive for victory. 

This temptation is very dangerous, since 
it leads to a neglect of God and of final 
salvation. A soul so averse to all exer- 
tion gives herself up to dissipation of 
mind and heart, so as to escape the sting 



ioz ON RESISTANCE. 

of conscience and to shut out the light 
which God, in His mercy, still grants to 
her, and which disturbs the false security 
in which she loves to dwell. 

The greatest danger of this state is that 
we scarcely dare pray for our conversion, 
forgetful that God is still full of good- 
ness and mercy, and desires our salvation 
far more than we ourselves do. We for- 
get His almighty power, who can, even 
then, defend and sustain us, and who will 
ever be faithful to His promise to succor 
those who appeal to Him with confidence. 
Unmindful of these truths we forsake 
prayer, or engaging in it with the convic- 
tion that we shall not succeed, we volun- 
tarily neglect that recollection and stifle 
that hope which would render it efficacious. 

It is singular that a person instructed 
in the truths of religion should be caught 
in this snare. Are we not taught, by 



ON RESISTANCE. 103 

revelation, that God does not command 
impossible things nor punish us for that 
which we had not the power to avoid? 
God, it is true, commands a perfection 
which is beyond the strength of unas- 
sisted nature, but which, with the help of 
grace, has been practised and is yet being 
practised by thousands like ourselves. 
He promises to assist us as He has aided 
them, if, like them, we invoke Him with 
confidence, and if, like them, we employ 
those means to which He has attached the 
victory. "Why," says St. Augustine, " can 
you not do that which so many others 
were able to do? Why can you not do 
that which so many have done, and are 
doing, with no more help than what God 
offers to you ? " And elsewhere, the same 
holy doctor tells us to do that which is in 
our power and to ask for that which is 
not, that we may be able to do it 



104 ON RESISTANCE. 

It is contrary, then, to the principles of 
religion to say that it is impossible for 
you to overcome yourself with the assist- 
ance of those graces promised to you 
if confidently solicited, and the use of 
those means indicated to you by divine 
providence. 

You say that you do employ these 
means, but that you are discouraged at 
seeing that in spite of all your endeavors 
you make no progress. You complain 
that after all your attention, and efforts, 
and struggles, you find the same inclina- 
tions rising again within you, and almost 
as strong as ever. And should you won- 
der at this? Can you free yourself in a 
few days from an inclination w T hich is 
natural to you or from a habit which your 
negligence has fostered ? Besides, you 
should not judge of the progress that you 
are making in grace by the continuance 



ON RESISTANCE. 105 

or diminution of the inclination which you 
wish to correct, but rather by the mastery 
which you are acquiring over it, in avoid- 
ing the faults into which you generally 
fall. This inclination, even though it con- 
tinues to make itself felt, is not a sin. 
It is an exercise of your virtue ; by resist- 
ing it you are meriting heaven. 

But every one knows that the stronger 
the passion and the older the habit, the 
greater must be our attention and vigi- 
lance over ourselves, and the greater our 
care to neglect no means that may lie in 
our power to overcome it. Why is it 
that you cannot do to-day what you could 
do yesterday ? The reason is not very 
hard to find. Yesterday, absorbed in God 
and animated by the desire of pleasing 
Him, you did violence to yourself, that 
you might follow His guidance and use 
the means which His prudence has pro- 



io6 ON RESISTANCE. 

vided, and to which He has attached His 
graces. To-day, tired of the combat and 
forgetful of God, you desert the path 
marked out by His providence, in order 
to indulge your sloth. It is your negli- 
gence that has given rise to this change of 
feeling. Return to your former disposi- 
tion, and you will persevere in the prac- 
tice of virtue. 

Finally, why should you be discouraged 
and give up everything because you have 
relapsed into your old faults? That 
would be to throw away your whole for- 
tune because you have lost a part. The 
whole world would cry out at such folly, 
where temporal wealth is concerned. 
These falls make known to you your 
weakness. If you reflect, as a reasonable 
creature and a Christian, you would be led 
at once to repair the damage which they 
have occasioned, and to guard yourself 



ON RESISTANCE. 107 

carefully against what may ensue, by an 
increase of confidence, of prayer, and of 
vigilance in avoiding all dangerous occa- 
sions. It is contrary to common sense to 
resolve to commit a hundred sins by 
throwing away the means to avoid them, 
because, forsooth, you have fallen into 
one, which, being repaired by contrition, 
would cease to offer any obstacle to your 
sanctification. 

Whilst we are satisfied that this reason- 
ing is based on principles that cannot be 
denied, we still refuse to be convinced, be- 
cause we are angry at our own weakness 
and wounded in our self-esteem ; we can- 
not bear the sight of our own humiliation. 
Dissipation alone can remove these dis- 
agreeable objects, and so we abandon 
ourselves to it in order to escape from 
ourselves. This impatience at the sight of 
our faults is a dangerous temptation. You 



108 ON RESISTANCE. 

should always resist it and overcome it by 
humbly acknowledging your sin before 
God. Your sorrow may indeed be a salu- 
tary feeling, which you can recognize in 
its effects. That which comes from God 
is humble, calm, and tranquil, and moves 
us to repair our fault and return at once 
to God. If it has not these marks, if it is 
attended with anxiety, discouragement, a 
turning away from God and from pious 
practices, then it is a temptation and a 
snare, and should not be indulged. Lift 
your mind and heart to God with confi- 
dence, and peace and order will soon be 
reestablished in your soul. God does not 
dwell in disorder, He is not to be found 
there. 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 109 

CHAPTER XVI. 

OUR SPIRITUAL EXERCISES A CAUSE OF REPUG- 
NANCE BECAUSE WE FALSELY THINK THEM 
USELESS OR THE OCCASIONS OF NEW FAULTS. 

It would seem that when this spirit of 
despondency takes possession of the soul, 
it deprives it of all light and of all power 
of reflection. It seems especially bent on 
destroying the spirit of prayer, thereby 
exposing the soul to imminent danger of 
final loss. For it is certain that we can- 
not save ourselves without the assistance of 
grace, nor can we obtain that assistance 
without persevering in sincere and fre- 
quent prayer. Nothing is more highly 
recommended to us in spiritual books 
than this means, the source of all the 
others which God inspires us to employ. 

There are those who regard this holy 
exercise as useless for them, because, 



no SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

through their habitual negligence, they 
enter on it with the conviction that they 
will perform it badly and with their 
accustomed indifference. This is the first 
thought that presents itself to their mind 
and, so far from resisting it as a Christian 
should, they grant it full admission. 

In this disposition they enter on their 
prayer without confidence, with no will to 
offer God the homage which is due to 
Him, with no sense of His presence, with 
no interior preparation, and with no effort 
to free themselves from a dissipation 
which has taken entire possession of mind 
and heart to the exclusion of all thoughts 
of God and their salvation. 

It is very certain that a prayer cannot 
be meritorious which is destitute of those 
essential qualities which God requires in 
it, that it may be heard ; and confidence 
is the first of those qualities. St. James 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. m 

says that he who prays should not hesitate, 
"For he that wavereth, is like a wave of the 
sea, which is moved and carried about by 
the wind; therefore, let not that man think 
that he shall receive any thing of the 
Lord" (James i. 6, 7). Still less shall 
he be heard, who does not merely hesitate, 
but ceases to hope for anything. Such 
persons, not attempting to overcome them- 
selves, are only occupied with useless 
thoughts ; they are so indifferent that they 
do not even reflect upon the action in 
which they are engaged and scarcely re- 
member that they are praying. And if the 
action is one of obligation, as in hearing 
Mass on Sundays, or holydays of obliga- 
tion, or in reading the office, or in the 
reception of the sacrament, they fail in an 
essential duty with scarcely any self- 
reproach, thus giving rise to conscientious 
doubts concerning sacraments which they 



ii2 SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

have approached without intention of 
amendment. 

It is your personal experience, you say, 
that convinces you that you will continue 
to fail in prayer, notwithstanding all your 
good resolutions. But whence comes this 
experience ? Let us examine into the first 
source of this negligence which persists 
in spite of all your resolutions. Do you 
pretend that those resolves, which are fre- 
quently the creatures of the imagination 
rather than of the will, should guard and 
protect you against your evil inclinations 
without your taking any precaution to 
defend yourself against their solicitations, 
without your striving to overcome them, 
and whilst you are voluntarily abandoning 
yourself to their impulses ? 

You are all day occupied in natural 
gratifications and frivolous amusements, in- 
tent on seeing and hearing all that is said 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 113 

and done, losing no opportunity for useless 
conversations, listening to any evil report 
against your neighbor, entering into his 
bickerings, blaming some, censuring others 
on reports which are often destitute of all 
foundation ; giving way, on the least occa- 
sion, to feelings of jealousy and prejudice; 
always distracted, occupied with the ac- 
tions and interests of others without a 
thought for yourself, your eternal interests, 
and your salvation ; prolonging this dissi- 
pation of mind and heart to the very be- 
ginning of your prayers, to which you 
hurry at the last moment, and without 
stopping to reflect for an instant on what 
you are going to do ; and you imagine 
that all this distraction and dissipation will 
suddenly disappear, and that recollection 
and devotion will as suddenly replace 
them, calm the tumult of your passions, 
and reawaken at once in your heart senti- 



n 4 SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

ments of faith, and piety, and love. In 
good sooth now, do you really expect such 
a miracle ? 

You have scarcely once thought of God 
during the day, you have not had toward 
Him those sentiments which are His due, 
you have shut your eyes to the light which 
He gave you, you have neglected and 
rejected His graces, that you might not 
be forced to look into yourself and scru- 
tinize your actions and their motives. 
And would you flatter yourself that in 
such a disposition, so wanting in fidelity, 
your past resolves will be sufficient to be- 
get anew that confidence in Him, that ten- 
der love and pious recollection, which are 
required for the holy exercise of prayer? 
Do you suppose that your thoughts, unre- 
strained and wandering throughout the 
day, will suddenly fix and concentrate 
themselves on God, withdraw themselves 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 115 

from so many objects to which they wera 
chained in order to dwell on subjects salu- 
tary, but, to the tepid soul, uninteresting? 
This would be a miserable illusion 
which reason herself points out, and 
which religion loudly condemns. It 
would be contrary to the wisdom of di- 
vine providence, which wills to conduct us 
to heaven by means which shall be pro- 
portional to the end, by a desire for sal- 
vation, by meditating on the best path 
to pursue, by watching over ourselves so 
as to avoid whatever may imperil our 
salvation, and by the practice of those 
virtues which render it secure. It would 
be opposed to the teaching of Jesus 
Christ in His holy Gospel, where He 
inculcates so earnestly recollection, ob- 
servation, mortification, and earnestness 
in prayer. Judge now of what would be 
the consequences and result of your con- 



n6 SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

duct and of the extent of the illusion to 
which you are given over. 

From this state there is no escape, ex- 
cept in undeceiving yourself on this point, 
and in making your resolutions more 
comprehensive. 

When, entering into ourselves, we 
recognize that the measures we have 
adopted have so far produced no effect, 
or but a passing one at most, must we 
on that account be depressed and give 
way to the thought that we shall never 
succeed? By no means, since it would 
be unreasonable in one who knows what 
God can and will do for the soul that 
hopes in Him, and sincerely tries to be 
faithful in His service. What we should 
think is this, that we have adopted means 
and methods which were insufficient and 
that we must select others which shall 
be more efficacious. Since by the re- 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 117 

suit we recognize our want of success, 
we must search into the cause of our 
defeat. For reason tells us that so long 
as the cause remains, the effect, suspended 
for a while, will be sure to return, and all 
the stronger, perhaps, that it has been re- 
sisted and restrained. Religion teaches 
us, moreover, that to cherish the cause 
when we have it in our power to remove 
it, is to remain willingly in the danger and 
to expose ourselves to fall. 

Now, in the case which we have sup- 
posed, the cause of all this difficulty in 
prayer, is, generally speaking, dissipation 
of mind throughout the day, forgetful- 
ness of God and our salvation. We 
live, so to speak, at haphazard; we per- 
form our actions without any definite ob- 
ject or aim, with no religious motive, 
and without any reference to God. Such 
aims as we have are human, founded 



n8 SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

only in nature, and but too often frivo- 
lous; we seek a satisfaction which is 
simply worthless, and our actions corre- 
spond to the lowness of our aims. 

According to the teachings of religion, 
our tendency should be toward the re- 
nunciation of self, the mortification of 
the spirit, of the will, and of the senses, 
a contempt for all those petty interests 
which the children of the world pursue 
with so much ardor. 

Our actions should be prompted by 
motives which have, or may be made to 
have, some relation to God. We are 
here on earth only to promote His 
glory, and everything which we do 
should tend to this end. If God be not 
at the beginning and end of all our 
actions, if they are not accompanied by 
a pious intention, they do not contribute 
to our real happiness — they are useless. 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 119 

Do you sincerely desire to rise from 
this state of tepidity and sloth, and to 
pray more easily, more piously, and with 
more fruit? Then, in the spirit of faith 
and in conformity with its truths, direct 
your resolutions to the maxims which I 
offer you. A forgetfulness of these truths 
was the cause of your evil; their appli- 
cation will be the remedy. Intent on 
your salvation, which you will then re- 
gard as your most important concern, 
you will be attentive to the lights and 
inspirations which God will communi- 
cate. Knowing the importance of those 
graces you will no more neglect them, 
you will not give yourself up to dissipa- 
tion in order to avoid them, you will 
thank God for them, you will cherish 
them, and cooperate with them faithfully. 

These Christian subjects, taking the 
place of your distracted fancies, will 



izo SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

guard you from useless preoccupation 
before the time of prayer, and will aid 
you, when engaged in the necessary duties 
of your state, to recollect yourself when 
presenting yourself before God. You will 
conform yourself to the order of provi- 
dence by your anxiety to make use of 
the means which God has appointed ; 
you will there find an increase of grace. 
More intent on your relations to God 
and to final salvation, you will walk with 
constancy, supported by grace, in the 
path of virtue, which leads to eternal 
happiness — from which you were with- 
drawn by your former conduct. 

When once we have recognized this 
maxim, that to conquer our faults we 
must attack them at the source, we 
should apply it on all occasions. Be- 
sides that dissipation of mind which 
leads us to omit our duties or to per- 



SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 121 

form them but imperfectly, there are 
other passions not so extensive in their 
consequences, which lead us into faults 
so frequently as to discourage the un- 
faithful soul. These passions have all, 
for their parent, a self-love which we do 
not repress. It may be a prejudice, 
which induces us to undervalue the 
good qualities and to exaggerate the 
least defects of an acquaintance; or such 
an attachment to our own will and judg- 
ment that we would force the whole 
world to our own opinion ; or, again, a 
restlessness of disposition that leads us 
to meddle with everything, and fix our- 
selves in nothing; or a haughtiness, a 
vain self-esteem, which resents the least 
slight, and would see the whole world 
at our feet; or — but who can enu- 
merate all the passions of the human 
heart ? 



122 SPIRITUAL EXERCISES. 

This we do know, that whatever the 
passion may be, which, in its undue ascen- 
dency leads us to discouragement, we 
should at once set ourselves to work to 
destroy it or at least to combat it without 
ceasing. An earnest desire for our salva- 
tion, to which it is an obstacle, frequent 
prayer, pious meditations on the maxims of 
the Gospel, the life of Jesus Christ and of 
His saints — these are means which provi- 
dence has provided us to stifle our passions, 
or so to weaken them, that they need not 
give us cause for fear. These means, 
when employed in the name of the Lord, 
are certain in their effect, agreeably to His 
promise. Then, nothing is impossible 
and nothing is useless. In the love which 
we conceive for our God everything will 
turn to our good. 

Behold the way laid open to you, the 
means that are given to your hand. If 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 123 

you do not succeed, it is your own fault ; it 
is on account of your resistance to divine 
grace. Do not reproach God, but blame 
yourself alone. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

IMPERFECT MOTIVES, JOINING THEMSELVES TO 
AN INTENTION OTHERWISE PURE, ARE ANOTHER 
SOURCE OF DISCOURAGEMENT. 

The necessity of acting in accordance 
with the divine will, so as to be pleasing to 
God and deserving of man, is readily ac- 
knowledged ; but many are held back from 
practising this salutary exercise because, 
when they are trying to direct their inten- 
tion, the evil spirit, or their imagination, 
insinuates other motives drawn from 
reason, self-love, human respect, or inclina- 
tion. Notwithstanding, then, the offering 



i2 4 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

which they are making to God, they are 
led to suspect that it is not for Him they 
act, but for their own satisfaction. The 
impression made by the natural motive is 
so vivid, and that made by the supernatural 
seems so feeble, that judging the intention 
according to the sensibility of the impres- 
sion, they decide that they are not per- 
forming the action for God's sake, and 
that it is therefore useless to offer it up to 
Him. They thus resign themselves to the 
merely human motives by which they are 
influenced. Discouraged by this tempta- 
tion, which becomes more and more fre- 
quent, they no longer think of offering up 
anything to God, and become at once the 
dupe and the victim of the father of lies, 
and of their own unfortunate illusion. 

To correct our notions on the subject, 
we have only to consider that our human 
motives cause this vivid impression, not so 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 125 

much by their strength, as by the fact that 
being in entire conformity with our nature 
and inclinations, we need no exterior help 
to enable us to understand and enjoy 
whatever they contain for our gratification, 
and because they find nothing in us to 
counteract the impressions which they 
excite. Supernatural motives, on the con- 
trary, cannot influence so sensibly, be- 
cause, being beyond nature and opposed 
to our own inclinations, we have need of 
God's help to overcome our rebellious 
passions, to appreciate their supernatural 
views, and to comprehend the advantages 
they present. 

This help, which God always affords to 
those who pray for it with confidence, 
sometimes excites an impression equally 
sensible ; but it is not always the case, for 
God is our sovereign Lord, and He im- 
parts His gifts to His creatures according 



iz6 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

to His own will and merciful designs. 
His assistance always enables us to resist, 
if we wish it, the temptation that would 
withdraw us from Him, and if the sensible 
feeling of that assistance is consoling, it is 
never necessary and not always useful. 
Even in worldly and temporal affairs we 
do not take as safe guides sentiments and 
feelings, however vivid, which are opposed 
to reasons solid and convincing. 

To judge, therefore, between contradic- 
tory motives for action, we should not 
be influenced by the vividness of their 
impressions. We should consider the 
motives in themselves, compare their ad- 
vantages and disadvantages, and then 
come to a decision, choosing those only in 
which we recognize a true and solid good. 
In this judgment we renounce all wrong 
motives, which we condemn, but as for 
those which are merely human and indif- 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 127 

ferent, we do not dwell upon them, we 
pass them by. With a will that disregards 
sensible impressions we adhere to those 
supernatural motives which our sober 
judgment has pronounced to be good and 
productive of our true happiness. 

But you will tell me that it seems to 
you, on many occasions, as if your decision 
would have been precisely the same 
whether you had God in view or not. 
Both my reason and my inclination, you 
will say, lead me to this course, and out of 
pure friendship I do what I would not do 
for all the world beside. In such cases 
have I not good reason to fear that my 
real motives are merely natural? 

In such cases, especially if we give way 
to our imagination, I grant that we may 
be led to doubt how far the supernatural 
motive influences our action. But even 
then, if we calmly resume the judgment 



iz8 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

which proclaimed its superiority and de- 
clared the relation which the action really 
has to God, there can be no longer any 
doubt what part this relation should have 
in our conduct. That, deliberately adopted 
by the will, makes over the action wholly 
to God. 

For God is, after all, the author of our 
intellect, and its suggestions, therefore, 
cannot, of themselves, vitiate the action. 
It is not opposed to the supernatural mo- 
tive of doing the will of God — on- the con- 
trary, it agrees with it ; why, then, should 
we think it necessary, in order to please 
God, to renounce the reason which He 
Himself has given? The less so, since it 
is often God that moves it, making use of 
that means to lead us to the practice of 
virtue. 

All that we have to do, then, is to ele- 
vate this motive by directing it to God, 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 129 

withdrawing it from the natural order, to 
place it, with the assistance of grace, in the 
supernatural order by directing it to 
heaven. 

When our human motives contain noth- 
ing opposed to virtue, we both can and 
should offer to God the actions to which 
they lead. For instance, when, after ris- 
ing early and fasting for many hours, you 
are about to partake of your morning 
meal ; when, after a whole morning spent 
in silence and recollection, you are about 
to take some recreation ; when, after a hard 
day's work, you are going to seek repose, 
are there not many natural reasons that 
induce you to these same actions? And 
should these reasons, which are founded 
in nature, prevent you from offering the 
action to God, and from elevating and 
sanctifying it by this voluntary inten- 
tion ? 



i 3 o IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

Surely St. Paul was not ignorant of the 
human motives that induce us to take food, 
and yet he exhorts us to do it for the glory 
of God : " Whether you eat or whether you 
drink, or whatsoever else you do, do it in the 
name of the Lord? evidently not deeming 
the natural incompatible with the super- 
natural motive. They do not even neces- 
sarily make the action imperfect, because 
they are not, in themselves, opposed to any 
virtue. And that which we do for the sake 
of a friend comes under the same princi- 
ple. We frequently do things for our 
neighbor which God neither commands 
nor forbids. But if we do them He wishes 
us to offer them up for His glory, as the 
end to which all our actions should tend. 

But the pretexts for discouragement and 
despondency are innumerable. I feel, you 
will say, that if these natural reasons did 
not impel me I would not perform this 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 131 

action, which, nevertheless, I know that 
God requires of me. 

Why trouble yourself with this thought, 
which is nothing but a temptation? Do 
you believe it to be just and well founded? 
We are not inquiring now what you would 
do if these natural reasons did not exist. 
It is always dangerous, as I have before 
said, to suppose yourself in circumstances 
in which God has not placed you. Ban- 
ish this thought — it is only a snare of the 
tempter who wishes to discourage you and 
to prevent you from doing a present good 
by the fear of a future and uncertain evil. 
There is question now only of performing 
well the action in which we are engaged, 
by following the method which religion 
prescribes. Apply yourself to calm reflec- 
tion on the soundness of your present mo- 
tives, with the firm confidence that, under 
different circumstances, if God permits 



1 32 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

them, He will also, according to His mer- 
ciful promise, grant you graces propor- 
tioned to your trials. Would you yourself 
suggest such doubts to a person of a gen- 
tle and amiable character, serving God 
with ease and facility and who should be 
troubled with the fear of not continuing 
in His service with the same courage, in 
case her character should suddenly become 
quick and passionate ? 

Among the motives which may influence 
us in the performance of works, good in 
themselves, there are some which are bad 
because contrary to Christian virtue; those 
we must renounce, for they render our ac- 
tions vicious. I have often noticed certain 
persons greatly troubled when they were 
trying to avoid giving scandal because 
they feared they were acting through hu- 
man respect. They did not understand 
the meaning of the words, and confounded 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 133 

ideas which are very different among them- 
selves. To give good example is not act- 
ing through human respect. The former 
motive has regard to the honor and glory 
of God, which we try to promote by not 
giving occasion to scandal. This motive 
leads us directly toward God; it is good 
and praiseworthy. Bad example is ex- 
pressly forbidden ; it is the scandal so 
distinctly denounced in the Gospel. In 
condemning the one, Jesus Christ com- 
mands the other : " So let your light shine 
before men, that they may see your good 
works, and glorify your Father, who is in 
heaven" (Matt. v. 16). He wishes us to 
animate them by our example. 

Where there is human respect, on the 
contrary, there is no thought of God, but 
all is love of self. We seek to please those 
whose judgment we fear, whose esteem 
we covet, or whose censure we deprecate. 



i 3 4 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

Human respect leads us to bad as readily 
as to good actions, according to the dispo- 
sition of those whom we seek to gain, and 
that, too, in opposition, very often, to our 
own tastes and feelings. 

These two feelings, then, are clearly 
different, and easily distinguishable. It 
would not be amiss if the former were a 
little more cultivated, especially in certain 
religious families and communities, where 
irregularities and bad examples are weak- 
ening good rules and customs. 

What chiefly frightens you in these hu- 
man motives, is that, in their absence, your 
action differs somewhat from that in 
which they second you. In order to de- 
cide on the reasonableness of your fears 
you have only to examine your disposition 
under these different circumstances. Does 
your perseverance depend exclusively on 
the presence of these motives ? Then in- 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 135 

deed have you reason to fear. But if it 
depends on some other cause you have no 
reason for alarm. 

When you are closely united to God in 
devotion, your mind and heart unagitated 
by passion, when you feel His presence 
sensibly, you do not need the support of 
these imperfect motives to enable you to 
resist your inclinations, or to perform 
some work of supererogation ; or you re- 
nounce them when you perceive that they 
are of such a kind as to be rejected, and if 
not, then you elevate them by directing 
them to God. This is a proof that they 
are not the sole motives of your con- 
duct. 

It is true, that whilst you are living in 
dissipation of mind and in a forgetfulness 
of God, you have some grounds to fear 
lest your actions should be solely prompted 
by natural feelings or even by passion. 



136 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

But this does not justify your fear that 
such is always the case, since it proceeds 
only from the dissipation in which you are 
living, which causes you to forget the God 
to whom you pertain, the salvation for 
which you should strive, and the grace 
which you receive but to neglect. It is 
an error to suppose that what sways us in 
one set of circumstances, rules us also in 
all the situations in which we find our- 
selves. Our thoughts and feelings in a 
state of recollection are very different 
from what they are when we are dissi- 
pated. Your fear is then unfounded, and 
you should not listen to it. 

Moreover, why should you be alarmed 
because the motives which spring from 
reason and from the natural virtues of 
friendship, gratitude, compassion, etc., pre- 
cede in your mind and heart the direct 
recognition of God? I have already re- 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 137 

marked that sensible objects naturally 
excite corresponding sentiments ; and that 
natural virtues come also from God and 
are not opposed to those which religion 
inspires and commands. They often serve 
to introduce these latter more easily into 
our heart. They create in us a disposi- 
tion which so far from opposing the ten- 
dency of virtue, causes us to practise it 
more willingly and easily. Hence, we are 
not obliged to repress or to renounce them, 
we have only to perfect them by directing 
them to heaven, according to the princi- 
ples of religion. And, in such a case, is 
it harder for us to direct our attention to 
the honor and glory of God, and the ac- 
complishment of His divine will? On 
the contrary, it is easier. 

You should console yourself, and en- 
courage yourself to perseverance by the 
reflection that grace is a light given to us 



1 38 IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 

by God, that we may recognize supernat- 
ural good, an inspiration to embrace it. 
It acts within us without our perceiving 
it and affords no certain sign of its pres- 
ence. As we hope for it, so we must 
presume that we possess it, after having 
prayed for it with confidence. We must 
then act as if we were assured of its pos- 
session, although we cannot be absolutely 
certain since no one knows whether he 
be worthy of love or hatred. 

From this method of God's influence 
within us, it follows that we may easily 
mistake for an operation of our own 
faculties, that which is in truth the effect 
of His grace, which enlightens us, and 
gives us sentiments that reason approves, 
and inspirations which lead us to the 
practice of virtue. So that what we hold 
to be merely natural, the fruit of our 
sagacity, or of our natural goodness of 



IMPERFECT MOTIVES. 139 

heart, is really the effect of a supernatural 
assistance which God imparts. 

If, then, to obey the precept which calls 
upon you to direct everything to God, 
you offer Him your actions, nothing will 
be wanting that is necessary to obtain 
the recompense which He has promised. 
Your actions will be performed for God 
through the help of His grace; He will 
be their source, their end, and their 
reward. You will not be making a mis- 
take then when you offer them to Him, 
since you obey a law which He has 
revealed, and, in not doing so, you would 
render them useless, since they would not 
be performed with the view of pleasing 
Him. You do it according to the light 
which God has given you to follow, and 
you do not mock Him when you do that 
which He inspires. 



i 4 o OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

IT IS AN ERROR TO SUPPOSE THAT WE SHOULD 
NOT OFFER OUR ACTIONS TO GOD, BECAUSE 
THEY HAVE NOT THAT PERFECTION WHICH 
WE DESIRE, OR THINK NECESSARY. 

You tell me that you dare not offer 
your actions to God, because you have 
conceived so great an idea of the perfec- 
tion which is required in an action before 
it can be worthy to be offered up to His 
divine majesty and infinite sanctity, whilst, 
at the same time, you do not perceive in 
yourself a determination to attain that 
perfection. You are led to suppose that 
unless your actions are possessed of this 
perfection they cannot please Him, and 
must necessarily be rejected. Influenced 
by this illusion, you offer up little or noth- 
ing to the Lord, and, losing sight of Him, 



OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 141 

you follow only your own inclinations ; 
and because you are not disposed to con- 
quer yourself in everything, you conquer 
yourself in nothing. 

Such a principle leads to nothing less 
than entire abandonment of heavenly 
things. Who will put himself to any 
trouble to please and glorify God, when 
he believes that God will reject his works 
unless they come invested with all that 
perfection which the saints are held to 
have practised ? 

This is the time to follow the advice of 
St. Augustine : " Do all that is in your 
power, and ask for that which is not, that 
you may be able to do it." This great 
saint differed very much from you, when 
he thus addressed his flock. It was be- 
cause he remembered that God, our loving 
and merciful Father, knows perfectly well 
of what leaven we are made, always comes 



1 42 OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 

to our help and assists us in proportion 
to our confidence. 

No one is made perfect in a day. 
According to the plan of divine provi- 
dence, we grow in the science of salvation 
through the use of grace, as in natural 
sciences, by reducing the principles to 
practice. This practice becomes more 
perfect in proportion to its frequency, and 
the attention it receives. To an artist 
who would not practise his art, or to an 
orator refusing to make a discourse, be- 
cause he cannot equal the great masters 
of old, we should infallibly predict a total 
and inevitable failure. It is not enough 
to be acquainted with principles ; we must 
apply them correctly. Exercise gradually 
develops talent. We must make many a 
daub before we produce a good painting. 
Persevering industry alone can correct the 
imperfections which we recognize in our 



OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 143 

work; experience proves this too conclu- 
sively to admit of a doubt It is by reflect- 
ing on our faults that we learn to avoid 
them, and this we can do only by losing 
no time, setting ourselves resolutely to 
work, and not resting satisfied with idle 
theorizing. 

In the science of the saints and in the 
practice of virtue, we need, besides industry 
and perseverance, particular assistance 
from God. If we desire to please Him 
we shall frequently ask His help, as the 
student has recourse to his master, but the 
principle remains the same. We shall 
never become perfect by a mere acquaint- 
ance with our rules, but by their applica- 
tion to our conduct. If we do not bring 
them to practice, we shall never attain 
perfection. I grant that in offering up 
our actions to God, we do not as yet make 
them perfect, but at least we divest them 



i 4 4 OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 

of many defects and render them less 
imperfect in His sight. The sacrifice 
which we make to God in removing these 
faults will prove beneficial, both by the 
habit which we thus contract of over- 
coming ourselves, and by the graces with 
which the Holy Ghost will reward our 
docility to His inspirations. 

Do, then, whatever you can, and ask 
with confidence for what is beyond your 
power. 

A person of quick temper, strongly 
attached to his own will and judgment, 
will, in his intercourse with others, yield 
twenty times a day to the impatience and 
impetuousness of his character; nothing 
will restrain him but the thought that he 
should refer all his actions to God. This 
reflection, if he tries to entertain it, will 
sustain him, at least on ordinary occasions, 
and if at other times it fails of complete 



OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 145 

success, it will certainly moderate the out- 
break and prevent many things which 
charity condemns. If, on the other hand, 
it has no effect at all, he must ask pardon 
for having resisted divine grace. The 
fault itself may serve for his improvement 
by humbling him before Our Lord, and by 
the salutary reflections which he will take 
occasion to make on his quick temper, 
when, having entered into himself, he asks 
God pardon for his sin. 

What we have here said in respect to 
impatience may be equally well applied 
to everything else that renders our actions 
imperfect. 

It is a fact, proved by experience, that 
we always derive benefit from this delib- 
erate reference of our actions to God. 
The thought, " I will do this for the love 
of God," cannot fail to make a salutary 
impression, to excite us to avoid the de- 



146 OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 

fects which creep into our best actions, 
and to sustain us in our interior struggles. 
If we are ever so little attentive to this 
practice we shall see that our actions be- 
come less defective, and daily grow in 
perfection through the graces which we 
receive. 

God always rewards the good will which 
we display in making use of the means 
which He has given for our sanctifica- 
tion. " Walk before Me, and be perfect" 
said He to Abraham (Gen. xvii. i). To 
walk in the presence of God is to refer 
all our actions to Him. 

But, you will say, when I offer up to 
God actions into which many imperfec- 
tions and even faults will necessarily 
enter, can I flatter myself that in spite 
of these they will be accepted by Him 
and meet with reward ? 

I take for granted that notwithstanding 



OFFERING OF OUR ACTIONS. 147 

the doubt which arises from ignorance, 
you do not deliberately intend to commit 
those faults which you foresee, and dread. 
If in the course of the action you be- 
come weak, slothful, tepid, and negligent, 
God will certainly reproach you for your 
negligence and for your faults, but it 
will be as a tender father who pities 
your weakness. His reproaches will ani- 
mate you to resist the sloth to which 
you have yielded, and in the infinite 
mercy with which He treats us, He will 
welcome the good will which you dis- 
played, although the execution proved so 
imperfect. 

A Christian, then, humbly recognizes 
his weakness and inconstancy, renews his 
confidence and love, and redoubles his 
prayers in the hope that God will give 
him more grace to be faithful in future. 
He will be very far from rejecting the 



148 LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

means of correcting himself. Let us re- 
peat it again and again, he must do what 
he can, he must ask for what is not in 
his power, in the firm conviction that 
this means, which God has given him, if 
it fail to-day, will succeed to-morrow, or 
the next day, or the next week — but will 
certainly succeed, if he only persevere in 
its use. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

A LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION AN UNJUSTIFI- 
ABLE CAUSE OF DESPONDENCY. 

If, by a particular disposition of divine 
providence, we have been favored for some 
time with sensible devotion, we are apt to 
yield to a despondency that we think well 
founded, when God changes in our regard, 
and ceases to visit us with consolations. 



LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 149 

A little reflection would secure us from 
this illusion. 

It is not acting the part of a Christian 
to yield to discouragement or despond- 
ency for such a cause. Is it for the sake 
of this spiritual sweetness, this sensible 
consolation, that we serve God ? Does 
God deserve nothing from us on His 
own account alone? Are not the enjoy- 
ment of God, and of the eternal reward 
which He has promised to those who 
persevere, sufficient to sustain us ? If 
not, and we are forced to acknowledge 
the sad truth, we should thank God for 
withdrawing His sensible graces; for we 
should have cause to fear that in serving 
Him we were only seeking ourselves, for- 
getful of that glory which He requires at 
our hands. 

If we fail in our resolutions under such 
circumstances, it is because, losing sight 



i 5 o LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

of God and being no longer attracted by 
sensible consolations, we do not exercise 
ourselves sufficiently in acts of faith, hope, 
and charity, of gratitude, and the desire 
of belonging entirely to our Maker. But 
if our heart remains in this tepidity, it 
must either occupy itself with natural 
gratifications, or abandon itself to de- 
spondency, and lose all courage. 

In whatever state your soul may be, 
faith is your only support, and must be 
your strength and consolation. Illumined 
by its light you will perceive the snares 
which environ you, and the means to 
avoid them. The direction of a soul by 
faith is much safer than that which relies 
on consolation. In the former, principles 
are ever the same, sure and unshaken; 
they are founded on truth and revelation, 
their consequences are readily perceived, 
as also the means which we must employ 



LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 151 

in their application. From these truths, 
that God the Creator of the universe is 
the sovereign Lord of creatures, and their 
last end, that He created them only for 
His glory, that He died in order to pro- 
cure them eternal happiness, we readily 
conclude that we must obey Him, refer 
all that we do to Him, and love Him 
above all things, no matter how He may 
dispose of us. These truths we may 
always find in religion if we are willing 
to perceive them; they always hold the 
same language to us and expose us to 
no illusion. The principles are clear and 
certain, and there is no need of much 
reasoning to deduce their practical con- 
clusions. 

Sensible devotion, on the contrary, is 
subject to illusion. We may easily mis- 
take a natural softening of the heart for 
a heavenly consolation. And so, after 



1 52 LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

having experienced the greatest sweetness 
in prayer, we remain with little strength 
or will to lead a life of greater recollec- 
tion, mortification, and regularity. In- 
stances of this kind are not unfrequent. 

As for those consolations, and that 
sensible devotion, which really come 
from God and produce in our soul pre- 
cious fruits of virtue and merit, they 
may be withdrawn. They are not neces- 
sary for salvation, and Our Lord may 
deprive us of them in order to teach us 
that if, on the one hand, we should re- 
ceive them with humility and gratitude, 
on the other we must not cling to them 
in such a way as to relax in our vigi- 
lance and to be troubled at their with- 
drawal. In depriving us of them, God 
does not abandon us; He wishes only 
to prove and to purify our love for Him. 

What is the conduct of one who, 



LOSS OF SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 153 

accustomed to be guided by sensible de- 
votion, finds himself suddenly deprived 
of its consolations ? He is without sup- 
port, and knows not where to look for 
strength and encouragement. Little used 
to act from that charity which springs 
from faith, he does not even think of 
adopting this means, the only one that 
remains, but of which he knows not the 
advantages. Troubled by his loss, he 
turns away from God by repeated infidel- 
ities, foolishly imagining that he is de- 
serted in that which is only meant for a 
trial. Every difficulty is exaggerated, and 
he is soon in danger of entirely forsaking 
God. 

If sensible consolations are more sweet 
and satisfactory, faith is more certain and 
meritorious. We should cling to it there- 
fore, at all times and under all circum- 
stances. Enjoy the consolations which 



154 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

God may send you, but in your actions 
be guided by the principles of faith. 
You will then have nothing to change 
in your conduct, when the time of conso- 
lation ceases. 



CHAPTER XX. 

FAULTS COMMITTED BY PIOUS SOULS IN TIME 
OF DESOLATION. 

Dryness and desolation are very try- 
ing to such as love God, and they cause 
many to fall into despondency. And yet 
their greatest trouble and danger spring 
from their own conduct under the trial. 
The first fault committed by such persons 
is a want of confidence in prayer, neglect- 
ing it or practising it with indifference 
at a time when they stand in the 
greatest need of its support. The diffi- 



FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 155 

culty which they experience is no reason 
for omitting those pious exercises, which 
duty, or their previous resolutions, pre- 
scribe. We cannot too frequently re- 
peat that virtue consists in doing the 
will of God. Does He require that at a 
certain time we should be occupied in 
mental or vocal prayer, spiritual reading, 
or any other spiritual exercise, then we 
must not fail to be there ; it may be the 
very time appointed by Him for the end 
of our trial, we must go with confidence, 
with the desire and expectation of profit- 
ing by those graces which He will be 
sure to provide. 

" But I do nothing when I am there," 
you will say ; " overwhelmed with weari- 
ness, trouble, and distractions, I have 
neither good thoughts nor good desires. 
My mind is dark and my heart is silent." 

I know how trying this state is in the 



156 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

constant effort which it requires. But 
it is a consolation to know that you are 
doing the will of God when you are 
there where He wishes you to be. He 
will not refuse to hear you, if you con- 
fidently ask for grace to bear with pa- 
tience this state of wearisomeness and 
disgust, and to persevere with fidelity, 
notwithstanding the trouble you expe- 
rience; and if He still defer to send the 
relief which you implore, it is only in 
order to test your love and increase your 
merit. 

Then, too, you do wrong to worry 
yourself on account of distractions. They 
are not faults, except inasmuch as you 
yield to them. If you overcome them 
as soon as you perceive them, your prayer 
is not the less agreeable to God; it be- 
comes doubly meritorious, for you are 
exercising at once piety and mortifica- 



FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 157 

tion. True merit consists in overcoming 
difficulties in a spirit of faith and char- 
ity. Even though the distraction returns 
every minute, continue to put it aside 
with the same fidelity, renewing again 
your sense of the presence of God, and 
you will have no ground for self-reproach. 
Lightness of mind distracts the heart in 
prayer, but, says St. Augustine, when we 
grieve at this weakness and humble our- 
selves on its account, our prayer is not 
interrupted. 

Religion is full of consolation to those 
who follow its principles, and observe the 
practices which it counsels or prescribes. 

If in time of prayer we experience 
neither pious thoughts nor good senti- 
ments, it may possibly be the result 
either of our trouble or our sloth. We 
are disturbed at our condition, and when 
we are in this state, we cannot reflect 



158 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

sufficiently to enable us to discover the 
proper remedies. We are in a manner 
blinded, not discerning or not attending 
to the means which present themselves 
confusedly to our mind, so as to seize 
and employ them. In our embarrass- 
ment, fear takes possession of our heart 
and paralyzes its action, it prevents the 
graces which God is disposed to give 
us, and places obstacles in the way of 
His bountiful goodness. 

Sloth, on the other hand, holds us 
back from reflecting seriously on the 
principles of faith, that we may follow 
them, and causes us to weary of the 
struggle in which we are engaged. 
Then comes the thought that we have 
not the strength to persevere in this 
self-combat. We resign ourselves finally 
to a negligence which renders our 
spiritual exercises yet more difficult 



FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 159 

and distasteful, or we give them up 
entirely. 

It is not difficult to find a remedy for 
both these evils. You must convince 
yourself that this state is not bad in it- 
self, and that, as I have already shown 
you, it can be made very pleasing and 
meritorious before God. Why then 
should it disturb you ? If you look 
only to heaven, you should regard the 
condition of your soul as a great bene- 
fit since it leads you there, and that, 
too, more securely than one which would 
be more agreeable to nature and to self- 
love. Open your heart to that con- 
fidence which religion inspires, and 
prepare to receive the succor which it 
furnishes. Accept this trial from the 
hand of the Lord, bear it with patience 
as long as He wills it, and offer it up 
to Him in a spirit of penance and ex- 



160 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

piation. Every one can and every one 
must humble himself before God, in thus 
submitting to the interior trials to which 
he is subjected. As for holy thoughts 
which may unite you with God, your 
present state itself will suggest them. 
So soon as your trouble and anxiety 
shall have subsided, your thoughts will 
turn to heaven from which your help 
must come. 

Prayer becomes another subject of anxi- 
ety. The tempter sets this snare for you, 
that by making it a source of trouble, he 
may prevent you from deriving any ad- 
vantage from its exercise. He seeks to 
draw you aside from the right path, by 
preventing you from following the inclina- 
tion which God gives you, that you may 
follow your own will in a kind of prayer 
which is your own choice and to which 
you are not called, contrary to the well- 



FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 161 

approved maxim, that in all things and 
especially in prayer we must follow the 
inspiration of God. 

If in prayer God suggests to us the 
contemplation of several virtues, so long 
as one is sufficient to engage our atten- 
tion we must not turn away to medi- 
tate another. So soon as that ceases to 
fix our thoughts, we must turn to the 
one which God suggests. But, as if it 
were necessary to occupy ourselves with 
only one subject, and it were impossible 
to attend usefully to several, a pious 
soul will often resist the inspiration and 
attach himself obstinately to the first, 
which has ceased to furnish him matter 
for meditation, and in striving to do his 
own will, contrary to the will of God, 
he will exhaust himself in useless efforts. 

God will attract another by prolonged 
contemplations on the great truths of 



1 62 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

religion, wishing him to penetrate them 
that he may be guided by them in his 
conduct But that is not the plan which 
he himself has devised. He wishes to 
be all affection for God, he is pleased 
with sentiments alone, and reflection 
wearies him. Leaving the path which 
God points out to him he enters one 
where he cannot find Him. He loses 
many a useful thought to occupy himself 
in vain sentiments, productive of no 
good because they are entirely his own, 
and then complains that he cannot apply 
himself to prayer. 

A third wishes to follow the ordinary 
method of prayer, meditating on the sub- 
ject which he has prepared, exciting the 
feelings which these reflections suggest, 
and taking the resolutions which seem 
appropriate. But this is not what God 
requires of him: He wishes to occupy 



FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 163 

his heart rather than his intellect. If 
he withdraws himself from the feelings 
which He excites, to give himself up to 
meditation, he will be assailed by a 
thousand distractions, especially if his 
imagination be very active, grasping the 
whole subject in a moment, and seeing 
everything, as it were, at a single 
glance. He will soon have neither salu- 
tary thoughts nor devout sentiments, and 
tired of struggling with himself, in de- 
spair of success, he will either forsake 
prayer entirely or pass the time in 
voluntary distractions. 

He who despairs of finding the God 
he is seeking with all his heart, falls 
into despondency» Prayer becomes a 
task and is abandoned,, Note it well; 
this difficulty in occupying ourselves in 
heavenly things, is the consequence of 
resisting the will of God that we may 



164 FAULTS OF PIOUS SOULS. 

follow our own. If we permitted our- 
selves to be led by the Holy Spirit, 
our complaints would soon cease, in the 
ease with which we should perform our 
spiritual exercises or in the benefit which 
we should derive from them in advancing 
to perfection. 

The ordinary method is an excellent 
one and that which we should follow in 
the commencement of our spiritual life. 
But when the spirit of God gives us a 
special attraction toward some other 
method of prayer, it is the advice of all 
spiritual directors that we should not re- 
sist, but follow the inspiration, according 
to the saying of Our Lord : " The Spirit 
breatheth where He will" (John iii. 8). 



HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 165 

CHAPTER XXI. 

ONE OF OUR PRETEXTS FOR ABANDONING PRAYER 
IS THAT WE LOSE OUR TIME. THIS IS USU- 
ALLY FALSE, AND OFTEN CRIMINAL WHEN 
TRUE. HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES USE- 
FULLY IN TIME OF PRAYER. 

There are some persons who do not 
seem to have an attraction for any par- 
ticular method of prayer. They prepare 
for their meditation by reading or hear- 
ing some subject read from a book; but 
either they forget it or the matter does 
not prove sufficient for the time. In 
this case, they know not what to do. 
They soon begin to think that they are 
losing time which might be better em- 
ployed elsewhere. Is it not better, they 
ask you, to obey this thought, than to 
spend the time devoted to prayer in 
doing nothing? 



1 66 HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 

This temptation, for it is nothing else, 
is dangerous and hurtful, since it leads 
the soul away from God by an occupa- 
tion undertaken in opposition to His will. 

And how, I would ask in turn, can a 
pious soul make such a complaint? 
Should we not blush to acknowledge that 
we cannot occupy our thoughts with 
God? If sloth and self-love permit, let 
us enter into ourselves, examining in His 
holy presence, whether our feelings, mo- 
tives, and conduct be conformable to our 
state, what are the passions which sway us, 
the occasions which give rise to our faults, 
and then giving way to our sorrow for 
having offended Him, let us seek the 
means which may effect our amendment. 
Here is a subject that is ever at hand, 
that cannot easily be exhausted, and 
which perhaps is one of the most useful 
we can select. 



HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 167 

How many similar thoughts present 
themselves for our meditation ! There is 
no one who cannot find among the lessons 
of religion some familiar subject on which 
he can fix his attention. 

With the publican, he may acknowl- 
edge himself unworthy of the goodness 
of God, implore His mercy, wonder at 
His patience in bearing with us, and 
humbly offer up his grateful thanks. 

With Mary Magdalen, he may bow 
down at the feet of Jesus, weep with 
grief at the sight of his sins, and so- 
licit His forgiveness. He may recall to 
his memory the benefits which he has 
received from the bounty of his Lord; 
creation, redemption, and that special 
providence which has placed him in the 
Church, the only ark of safety ; the good- 
ness with which He seeks us when we 
wander away, the patience with which 



168 HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 

He views our resistance of His grace, 
the sweetness with w T hich He leads us 
back to the path from which we have 
strayed. 

Such reflections as these, and number- 
less others like them, based upon what 
we owe to God and upon our relations 
with eternity, would be sufficient to occupy 
us without difficulty, and without compel- 
ling us to remain in any one longer than 
we are able to draw fruit from it. 

If our imagination be quick and lively, 
it will be more easily fixed by contemplat- 
ing some sensible object in which we take 
interest. Our Lord Jesus Christ, God 
and man, is such an object, capable of 
exciting in the soul the liveliest interest. 
What utility may we not derive from this 
contemplation in prayer ! 

We may represent Him to ourselves 
teaching the multitudes, and we will dwell 



HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 169 

on the truths which He reveals. We may 
consider Him as He lived on earth; we 
see how intent He was on His Father's 
glory; His fidelity in accomplishing His 
will, however difficult or painful; His 
patience, His love for mankind, as shown 
in the humiliations and sufferings to 
which He submitted Himself for their 
sake. What examples for ourselves are 
to be found in all the virtues practised 
by our divine Saviour! These examples 
are all sufficient to strike the imagina- 
tion and employ it profitably, if w r e will 
only take the pains to make their appli- 
cation to ourselves. 

Our prayer is frequently performed in 
the presence of the Blessed Sacrament. 
This should recall to our minds the sac- 
rifice which Jesus makes of Himself on 
our altars; His dwelling in the taber- 
nacle; the holy table to which He in- 



i 7 o HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 

vites us, where He feeds us with His 
precious body and blood, and where He 
has so frequently united Himself to us 
so intimately and so perfectly. What 
thoughts and feelings will not be inspired 
by these prodigies of love if we are ever 
so little diligent in their consideration ! 
If, notwithstanding all this, our imagina- 
tion still continues to wander, let us turn 
our eyes to the altar where Jesus Christ 
reposes, fix them on the cross on which 
He is suspended, and we shall soon be 
drawn back to Him. 

No matter what the condition in which 
your soul may be, always commence your 
prayer with the firm hope that it will 
prove for you a time of great merit. 
Since it is God that calls you to it, you 
will be sure to receive abundant graces 
in return for the sacrifice which you 
make of your will. Your confidence will 



HOW TO OCCUPY OURSELVES. 171 

give you that holy familiarity which you 
should have for a Father who is infinitely 
good; it will fill your heart with love, 
and console you in your troubles by the 
hope of reward. You will experience 
His assistance in resisting and overcom- 
ing your passions, which are the enemies 
of His glory no less than of your hap- 
piness. Do not allow yourself then to 
be troubled ; do not listen to sloth, and 
fear nothing, since you are under the 
protection of a God who is infinitely 
good, infinitely powerful, and ever faith- 
ful to His promises. 

You will always find occupation for 
your thoughts, or in your struggles, the 
means of meriting eternal happiness. 



1 72 SENSIBLE DEVOTION 



CHAPTER XXII. 

TO STRIVE FOR SENSIBLE DEVOTION IS USELESS, 
OFTEN DANGEROUS, AND GIVES OCCASION FOR 
DESPONDENCY. 

Another source of despondency is to 
be found in the efforts which we make 
to excite sensible devotion, efforts which 
call forth all our strength. We fancy 
that without this sensibility, we cannot 
please God, as though He who scruti- 
nizes the heart would take account of so 
equivocal a proof of piety; or as though 
our divine Saviour, in the agony of His 
desolation in the garden of Olives, had 
not been equally, as ever, pleasing to 
His heavenly Father. 

If you are in such a state, learn that 
you will gain nothing by trying to raise 
yourself above the level of the graces 



SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 173 

which you have received. Instead of 
struggling for sensible devotion, which 
is withheld from you for the time being, 
be satisfied to fix your thoughts on God 
according to the grace which He imparts. 
If He wishes you to walk in the light of 
faith and reason alone, with no other 
feelings save what they inspire, you must 
continue in that way till He bid you 
change. Content yourself with regulat- 
ing your conduct by the truths of reli- 
gion and the maxims of the Gospel, 
humbling yourself before God on account 
of your transgressions, and adopting such 
resolutions and such means as shall en- 
able you to avoid them. He will accept 
your sentiments, strengthen your reso- 
lutions, and reward them with His most 
precious graces. 

This, you will say, is precisely what I 
do, and yet I feel that, in so doing, I have 



174 SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

no love for God, that is, it seems to me 
that my heart has no part in the senti- 
ments which my lips express. Sometimes, 
indeed, I find sentiments arising within 
me that are opposed to those which I 
could wish to have for Him, and hence 
my trouble, my weariness, and discourage- 
ment. 

If you will only examine this feeling 
calmly you will soon be relieved. God re- 
quires only that our love for Him should 
be sincere. In order to be reassured con- 
cerning this sincerity, it is not necessary 
that your sentiments should be character- 
ized by that sensibility which fills the 
heart with sweetness and rapture, it is 
sufficient that they should really exist in 
the soul, that is, in the reason, in the will ; 
and you must judge of their sincerity by 
your readiness to reduce them to practice. 
When this is the case your feelings are 



SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 175 

true and sincere, and they will be super- 
natural if accompanied by divine grace. 

There is nothing singular in all this. 
How often do we not find in our inter- 
course with others a true and sincere dis- 
position to oblige though unattended by 
that sensibility which accompanies a ser- 
vice rendered to a friend? And even 
when assisting a friend, is it not frequently 
without any pleasure or inclination, and 
not without a certain repugnance? And 
is not our service in such a case all the 
more praiseworthy? This is the instruc- 
tion that we give to those who are pre- 
paring themselves for the Sacrament of 
Penance ; it is not necessary, we tell them, 
that your contrition should be sensible, 
suffice it that it be sincere in the resolution 
to lead a better life for the future. 

Your complaint, therefore, of the absence 
of all sensible devotion is without founda- 



176 SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

tion, and the consequent despondency 
unreasonable. Instead of troubling your- 
self about it you should only despise it. 
What you have to do is simply to have 
recourse to God, that your sentiments, 
being accompanied by His grace, may be 
rendered supernatural and may want none 
of that perfection which He desires. 

Sensible fervor in your spiritual exer- 
cises, in your love of God or of your 
neighbor, is what God neither commands 
nor requires, since it is independent of your 
exertions. You cannot excite it with all 
your industry and all your efforts, a reason 
which alone should suffice to console you 
in its absence. When the Lord sends it, 
it comes without an effort; if He with- 
holds it, all our efforts would be in vain. 
You only weary your mind in the struggle 
to excite it; instead of increasing, you 
diminish the devotion which faith would 



SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 177 

otherwise inspire. Follow the guidance of 
the Holy Spirit, wait till He visits you and 
do not forestall His movements except by 
your prayers. 

That sensible fervor which softens and 
ravishes the heart, filling it with a rapture 
which some have been unable to support, 
is one of those graces which are ordinarily 
the reward of interior mortification, graces 
which are means to perfection but which 
God grants or withholds according to the 
inscrutable designs of His providence. 
We may pray for this fervor and receive it 
with gratitude, but we must await it with- 
out impatience, enjoy it with moderation, 
and be prepared to give it up whenever 
God shall require the sacrifice. 

We can, most assuredly, please God and 
entertain for Him sentiments which are 
real and sincere without experiencing this 
sensible fervor, although occupied with 



i 7 8 SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

thoughts which are the most capable of 
exciting it. In such meditations it is 
sufficient to hold ourselves willing and 
determined to prefer God before all things 
else whatsoever. This feeling of love for 
God may always be excited by appealing 
to the motives of faith, which are too well 
known to need repetition. As this charity 
is necessary for salvation, God is always 
ready to assist us in eliciting it through His 
grace, when we implore it with confidence. 
It is this sincerity of affection whereby 
we unite ourselves to God by the free 
choice of our will, that renders us pleasing 
in His eyes. Any one who lives the life 
of faith can recognize this sincere deter- 
mination in himself, in the means which 
he adopts, in accordance with the Gospel, 
to place and maintain himself in this 
disposition. I do not affirm that he can 
be absolutely certain, but that he may find 



SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 179 

evidence sufficiently strong to reassure 
him in this state of dryness, weariness, and 
involuntary tepidity in which God allows 
him to remain, and to give hope that 
through His mercy it will conduce to his 
salvation. 

And take notice that a soul which is 
visited with great sensible devotion, not 
knowing whether it is the operation of 
divine grace, is assured no more than 
any other of loving God sincerely and 
supernaturally. Your security, therefore, 
would not be greater were you possessed 
of this sensible fervor which you desire 
and the absence of which causes you 
trouble and discouragement. 

Nor must you be surprised if you per- 
ceive very sensibly the presence of feelings 
which are opposed to those which you 
desire to entertain, for this happens in 
every temptation. 



180 SENSIBLE DEVOTION. 

The passions are always more quick 
and sensible in the feelings which they 
excite. We perceive them more readily 
and vividly because they incline us to- 
ward sensible objects which are more con- 
formed to our natural inclinations and to 
the inspirations of self-love. This sensi- 
bility resides in our nature and requires 
no exterior help. 

On the contrary, a sensibility to the 
things of God is an effect of His grace 
not accorded to all. The feelings excited 
by faith, not being in accordance with 
our self-love, interfere with its inclinations. 
It is then not surprising that you should 
perceive a sensibility in the one case and 
none in the other, unless God should 
Himself grant it to you. You should not 
therefore allow yourself to be troubled or 
frightened, but should act in this state of 
dryness, weariness, and disgust as you do 



USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 181 

when subjected to any other temptation. 
After recommending yourself to the mercy 
of God, put away those feelings which 
disturb your union with Him, reflect on 
the motives which should lead you to 
Him, and make acts of that charity which 
faith and divine grace have imparted to 
your reason and your will, rather than 
to your feelings. Force the temptation to 
leave you ; you may have less consolation 
but you will have more merit, and merit 
is far superior to consolation. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

ON THE USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS DURING TIME 
OF PRAYER, OR WHEN ATTENDING AT MASS. 

There are some who, finding that their 
mind and heart furnish them nothing in 
this state of dryness by which to unite 



1 82 USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 

themselves to God, have recourse to spirit- 
ual books to aid their recollection and 
preserve them from distractions. This 
means is sometimes good ; for reading 
arrests and fixes the imagination. If 
occasionally it wander, it can be brought 
back to God by the thoughts and senti- 
ments contained in the book before us. 
But I think that we should not adopt this 
means hastily nor without such precau- 
tions as are necessary to its utility. 

In the first place, we must not have 
recourse to it through sloth, trying to 
avoid the difficulty of fixing our thoughts 
on God. Such a motive would only 
deprive you of His assistance and prevent 
you from finding that recollection which 
you seek. To draw down upon yourself 
the mercy of the Lord the motive of your 
action should be good, whereas this, on 
the contrary, is not. 



USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 183 

Not only would you be disappointed in 
that which you intended, but you would 
moreover be subject to a new incon- 
venience. You would lose the habit of 
fixing your attention on heavenly thoughts, 
so that when deprived of spiritual books 
you would find yourself at a loss what to 
do during the time of prayer and Mass. 
When, before the Blessed Sacrament or in 
your chamber, you should wish to elevate 
your mind and heart to God, the same 
spirit of indolence would interpose to 
deter you. You should therefore employ 
this means only when, in spite of your 
good-will and your efforts, the imagina- 
tion continues to go astray before you 
are aware of its wandering. God will 
then bless the care which you take to 
avoid forgetting Him even by involun- 
tary distractions. 

We ought to follow the customary order 



i8 4 USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 

of providence in things pertaining to our 
salvation. When you are reduced to the 
necessity of helping yourself by a spiritual 
book, you should select one which is con- 
formable to the exercise in which you are 
engaged. It is the will of God that at 
that time you should be occupied in cer- 
tain reflections or sentiments, and as we 
should not depart from that order of provi- 
dence for which our graces are promised 
and prepared, you ought to take that book 
which is best adapted to aid you in ful- 
filling the duty. 

Do not imitate such as during Mass 
take up the first pious book that comes to 
hand or that pleases their taste. Whilst 
they are reading a sermon or some favor- 
ite author, and absorbed in their reading, 
the time passes away without their being 
aware that they are assisting at the holy 
sacrifice, or at least without their eliciting 



USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 185 

those pious sentiments which this mys- 
tery of the love of Jesus for us should 
inspire. How many graces are not lost 
by such conduct which testifies their indif- 
ference for their divine Redeemer immo- 
lated every day on the altar ! How can 
it be otherwise, since they ask Him noth- 
ing at a time when He is unable to refuse 
them anything, having established the 
throne of His mercy on the altar of His 
temple ? 

Besides, if such conduct were not ex- 
posed to this objection, it would still be 
contrary to the spirit of the Church. 
That loving Mother of the faithful, careful 
of everything that may contribute to their 
salvation, exhorts them to unite them- 
selves with the priest in offering this holy 
sacrifice to the almighty Father. The 
consecration is the part of the priest alone, 
but the offertory which precedes it is com- 



1 86 USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 

mon to all the faithful, whom he invites to 
unite with him in soliciting the graces of 
heaven upon the whole Church. " Orate, 
fratres : pray, my brethren, that my sacri- 
fice and yours may be acceptable to 
God the Father almighty." To conform 
to this spirit you should, during Mass, 
make use of books containing prayers 
suited to the different parts of the sacri- 
fice, which may enable you to unite your- 
self with Jesus Christ in the different 
sentiments inspired by the sacrifice which 
He offers to His Father for your benefit ; 
or by books, which, in the considerations 
they contain concerning the Eucharist, 
enable you to produce appropriate acts 
of faith, hope, love, and gratitude. This 
sacrifice is the effect of love, and love can 
be repaid by love alone. Consult your 
own heart and it will say : " It is strange 
that whilst Jesus Christ is working for you 



USE OF SPIRITUAL BOOKS. 187 

the most stupendous miracles you should 
be doing nothing to testify your grati- 
tude." 

I do not pretend to say that it is abso- 
lutely necessary that you should hear 
Mass in this manner. I know that to 
assist worthily at the holy sacrifice it is 
sufficient that you should be engaged in 
prayer, vocal or mental, in union of inten- 
tion with the priest ; but I assert that 
when we are obliged to have recourse to a 
book to aid us in recollection we should 
rather select one which will best enable 
us to enter into the spirit of the holy 
exercise. 

Do not say with those whose thought- 
lessness is observable in all things, that it 
is tiresome to be always repeating the 
same thing. The Mass is not an amuse- 
ment in which we seek variety. It is the 
most holy, the most august, the most sub- 



1 88 PLAN OF READING. 

lime act of our religion. Its motives 
remain ever the same and the sentiments 
which it inspires cannot be repeated too 
frequently or too deeply engraven on our 
heart. God always receives them with 
love, He never leaves them unrewarded. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

WHAT BOOKS WE SHOULD USE DURING PRAYER 
AND WHAT PLAN WE SHOULD ADOPT IN 
THEIR PERUSAL. 

In using books during time of prayer 
it is important to be careful in our choice, 
and to follow a useful plan in their pe- 
rusal. There are books which contain 
meditations in which the soul rises, as it 
were, to the very bosom of God, losing 
itself in His infinite perfections, and pene- 
trating into the deepest and most hidden 



PLAN OF READING. 189 

mysteries. These are not the books for 
one who asks a remedy for distraction. 
God alone can introduce us to this kind of 
contemplation, and when He calls us to it 
we engage in it without difficulty. To 
strive for it of our own accord and with- 
out being attracted to it by divine grace, 
would be an error and an illusion. Not 
God, but pride and presumption would 
become our guide in this extraordinary 
path. Self-love and self-esteem, insinu- 
ating themselves into our prayer, would 
prevent us from deriving fruit for our- 
selves ; they would separate us from God 
instead of uniting us to Him, or, in the 
supposition of our good faith, the use- 
lessness of our efforts would lead to 
despondency. 

It is to that meditation which is pos- 
sible to every Christian soul that I here 
allude. Prayer is intended not only to 



190 PLAN OF READING. 

enlighten the mind concerning the truths 
of religion and the extent of our duties, 
but to stimulate the will to greater union 
with God through its affections, and to 
a practice of those virtues in which we 
find our sanctification. Of what use 
would it be to know our duties if we do 
not strive, through religious motives, to 
love them with a view to please God. 

A book, therefore, which serves only 
for instruction, which does not propose 
the motives that excite the will to practise 
the resolutions suggested, would not be 
one suited to a time of prayer. Generally 
it is not so much instruction that is wanted, 
as the will to put it in practice. 

Practical books of meditation are what 
we need, those which combine reflection 
and sentiment, and which cause us to love 
our duty whilst making it known. With 
any others we are in danger of losing the 



PLAN OF READING. 191 

habit of the ordinary meditation and of 
finding ourselves at a loss, when we wish 
,to reflect on the truths of religion, to 
draw practical conclusions or to form reso- 
lutions for the regulation of our conduct, 
because we have rendered this method 
unfamiliar by the use of books which do 
not follow it. 

Prayer is not a study, but a means of 
leading us to virtue by the motives which 
religion offers. It is not sufficient that we 
should be acquainted with our obligations, 
we must be attached to them through a 
desire of pleasing God. 

If you wish to derive fruit from this holy 
exercise through the help of books, be 
careful not to read without occasional 
pauses. Meditation and spiritual reading 
are two different exercises. Meditation is 
intended to unite the heart with God; 
never lose sight of this truth. The heart 



1 92 PLAN OF READING. 

is attached only through its own affections 
and sentiments; in books you meet only 
the affections and sentiments of others. 
They will interest your mind but will be 
foreign to your heart unless you stop, 
from time to time, to reflect on the mo- 
tives presented to you and thus excite the 
heart to make them its own by reproduc- 
ing them. 

We do not sanctify ourselves by reading 
in a book the love which some one else 
had for God, but by that which we our- 
selves conceive and actuate. 

From such reading you will come with 
a heart as empty as when you began be- 
cause it will have done nothing for itself. 
Prayer is more an exercise of the heart 
than of the intellect. Prayer in which the 
heart has no part is but the exterior of an 
edifice in which there is nothing within. 
And hence it is, that they who make use 



PLAN OF READING. 193 

of books and who do nothing but read 
them, arise from prayer very well satisfied 
with themselves, perhaps, but as little rec- 
ollected in spirit as they were before. 
They leave without having made any reso- 
lutions to serve God better in the future. 
The heart, having done nothing toward 
its own reformation, resumes its inclina- 
tions and continues to abandon itself to 
their attraction. From prayer they run to 
dissipation, which they have not learned 
to renounce. 

Read, then, if you find difficulty in 
recollecting yourself in God, but read in 
a spirit of faith and when you meet with 
reflections which you can apply to your- 
self, do not pass them lightly by ; weigh 
them well and engrave them deeply in 
your mind, that your heart may closely 
embrace them. They will serve to correct 
some defects which they will make known 



i 9 4 PLAN OF READING. 

to you, to confirm you in the love of 
virtues which you will find occasion to 
practise. 

And if, in your reading, you find some 
good sentiments, do not think it enough 
to admire them, but try to make them 
your own. In the holy confidence that 
through the mercy and grace of God 
you, too, can be elevated to the perfection 
of sentiment which so many others have 
reached before you, stop and try to ex- 
cite your heart to their reproduction, not 
once, but again and again, and in different 
ways and for the different motives which 
the Holy Spirit will suggest, and do not 
leave them so long as they serve to 
occupy your attention. If your imagina- 
tion wander, return to your reading and 
continue it after this method, never forget- 
ting that books are not intended to encour- 
age indolence, but to favor recollection. 



PLAN OF READING. 195 

If on such occasions God sends you 
some good thought, though it be not 
connected with what you are reading, 
leave the book and pursue the thought; 
the Holy Spirit breathes where He 
chooseth ! 

Self-ease, always fearful of trouble, may 
suggest to you that you should disregard 
the inspiration and continue, in the hope 
of finding, farther on, something more use- 
ful to you. Do not listen to its sugges- 
tion; it is a snare of the enemy who 
wishes to make you unfaithful to the grace 
which you have received and to cause you 
to lose the fruit of your meditation. 

The truths that we read as those too 
which we meditate, make a salutary im- 
pression on our heart in proportion only 
to the grace with which God accompanies 
them. He it is who speaks to the heart 
and who renders fruitful the salutary 



196 PLAN OF READING. 

thought. You should therefore read in a 
spirit of faith, of confidence, and docility. 
God, who has been pleased to attract 
your attention at this moment, may not 
attach the same grace if you seek it else- 
where and your unfaithfulness may be the 
cause of loss. It will be your own fault 
if your prayer does not produce all the 
good that you had expected. The same 
temptations, moreover, may lead you to 
overlook the succeeding reflections as you 
did the first. Your meditation will prove 
to be only a spiritual reading, indifferently 
made, from which you will derive no 
advantage. 

But, you object, if I stop in this way I 
shall not have time to finish the points of 
the meditation. 

And, pray, what necessity is there of 
considering them all, if one alone suffices 
to occupy you ? Why should you aban- 



PLAN OF READING. 197 

don a thought that engages your atten- 
tion in a salutary manner, in order to 
seek another which may not be so suc- 
cessful? Why leave a certain to pursue 
an uncertain advantage ? This would be 
listening to your own inconstancy and not 
to the spirit of God. 

In the reflection which you are desirous 
of passing by you may find two things; 
either a defect to be overcome, or a virtue 
to be practised : or again, some fresh 
motive for loving God. The former may 
serve to your correction and, it may be, in 
some important point; the second should 
serve to increase your disposition to 
cultivate every virtue. Charity embraces 
all things and if we remain so weak and 
imperfect, it is because we do not love 
sufficiently. Can you find anything better 
elsewhere ? 

Make use, then, of the grace which is 



198 PLAN OF READING. 

offered to you. Never exchange certainty 
for uncertainty. Lean more to sentiment 
or feeling than to reflection. When the 
heart is united to God the mind is more 
easily fixed and the imagination less dis- 
posed to wander. 

Finally, it cannot be doubted that to 
reach God and heaven we must follow 
His inspirations and be guided by His 
spirit. If He seems to abandon you, do 
not be afraid; remain firm and constant. 
Hope is a port of refuge against storms 
and tempests. Even though you were 
at the bottom of an abyss, God, in His 
mercy, would draw you out. No matter 
what our state may be we must never 
allow ourselves to despair; and discour- 
agement, when deliberate and voluntary, 
whatever may be the pretext, is as unrea- 
sonable as it is criminal. 



ON TEMPTATIONS. 199 



CHAPTER XXV. 

TEMPTATIONS NO PROOF OF GOD*S HAVING 
ABANDONED US. IF SOMETIMES A MARK OF 
HIS ANGER, IT IS AN ANGER TEMPERED BY 
MERCY. 

Temptations trouble pious souls and 
plunge the dissipated over the precipice. 
In order to prevent the evil which they 
may produce it is well to give you the 
reasons for not fearing them, the prin- 
ciples by which you should be guided on 
different occasions, the way in which you 
should behave when assailed and by 
which you may preserve yourself against 
their assaults, and, finally, the advantages 
which you may derive from them. 

A temptation is a thought, a feeling, an 
inclination, a tendency, which solicits us 



200 ON TEMPTATIONS. 

to violate the law of God for our own 
satisfaction. They should neither trouble 
nor discourage a Christian soul. The 
devil declares war especially against those 
who detest his rule, who fight against 
their passions, who are disciples of Jesus 
Christ as much by their purity of love as 
by the ineffaceable seal of regeneration, or 
against those who seriously think of throw- 
ing off the yoke which he has imposed 
upon them. In his attempts against 
them, he seeks only to make them re- 
nounce the love of Jesus Christ, to sepa- 
rate them from God by making them his 
partners in disobedience. This reflection 
should prove the consolation of those who 
are tempted. It is their contradiction with 
him, the enemy of their salvation, their 
love for piety and for the will of God, that 
draw upon them this persecution. A 
little perseverance will make them victo- 



ON TEMPTATIONS. 201 

rious and, above all, will strengthen them 
in virtue. 

Souls that are naturally timid, or whom 
the Lord has conducted for a long time 
by a cessation of passion and the sweet- 
ness of peace, are apt to imagine that 
these temptations which they sometimes 
experience are signs of God's anger, and 
they even come to think themselves aban- 
doned when the temptation becomes 
strong and frequent. They cannot per- 
suade themselves that God can look with 
a favorable eye upon a heart agitated by 
sentiments so opposed to virtue. This is 
the last resource of the enemy for the 
overthrow of a soul which he has been 
unable to seduce by the empty pleasures 
of vice. He takes away that precious 
confidence which would sustain it against 
all the assaults of hell. 

Such souls are greatly deceived. Those 



202 ON TEMPTATIONS. 

who are instructed, who are better 
acquainted with the ways of providence, 
are not surprised at the struggle in 
which they are engaged. They have 
learned from the Holy Ghost, that the 
life of man is a perpetual combat ; that we 
are obliged to defend ourselves, without 
ceasing, from within, against our tastes, 
our inclinations, our self-love, domestic 
enemies who are ever ready to betray us 
by their snares and their suggestions; 
from without, against the influence of bad 
example, human respect, and the powers 
of hell, jealous of man's happiness and 
conspiring against him from the beginning 
of the world. 

They know that it is only by the vic- 
tories which we gain through the assist- 
ance of grace, that we force our way to 
heaven, and that, according to the Apos- 
tle : " He also, that striveth for the 



ON TEMPTATIONS. 203 

mastery, is not crowned except he strive 
lawfully " (2 Tim. ii. 5). 

St. Paul, although he prayed to be 
delivered from them, did not regard the 
temptations which he continued to expe- 
rience as signs of God's having abandoned 
him. The saints, so long and so violently 
attacked by the devil, even in the desert 
and in the exercise of the severest pen- 
ance, had not this idea of temptations. 
On the contrary, they always regarded 
them as the object of their struggles and 
the subject of their merit. They knew 
what was said in the Holy Scripture: 
"Because thou wast acceptable to God, it 
was necessary that temptation should prove 
thee" (Tob. xii. 13). This is the view that 
you too should take; it is the only one 
that is correct according to the principles 
of religion; and then you will no longer 
be troubled or discouraged. 



20 4 ON TEMPTATIONS. 

But, though temptations are no sign of 
our being forsaken, since God never en- 
tirely abandons man so long as he is alive, 
and though they are generally a trial of 
the just, yet they are sometimes the effect 
of divine justice which punishes thereby 
our negligence in the divine service, the 
weakness of slothful and presumptuous 
souls, the indulgence of natural inclina- 
tions. But whether they be a punishment 
or a trial, our submission in receiving 
them and our fidelity in resisting them, 
must be still the same. From the most 
loving of Fathers we cannot expect a 
justice unaccompanied by mercy. His 
grace always follows on prayer and confi- 
dence. He does not desire our destruction ; 
He punishes us only to regain us. And 
so far from being discouraged and 
troubled, we should be animated in the 
combat by the pardon which is extended 



TEMPTATIONS IN REGARD TO GOD. 205 

to us, if, with an humble and contrite 
heart, we faithfully perform the penance 
which God imposes. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

TEMPTATIONS NO SIGN OF A DANGEROUS STATE 
OF THE SOUL IN REGARD TO GOD AND SAL- 
VATION. 

Frequent temptations may prove that 
the heart is subject to passions and in- 
clined to evil, but, when rejected, they do 
not indicate that it is bad or separated 
from God. This inclination to evil which 
we inherit from our birth as a consequence 
of the sin of our first parents, is sometimes 
increased by the influence of the senses on 
the soul. They render us more or less 
subject to temptation, according as their 
impressions are more or less strong; and 



zo6 TEMPTATIONS IN REGARD TO GOD. 

this being independent of our will and not 
having its origin in the heart, does not in- 
dicate a vicious state. It is not the cause 
of this sensible disturbance; on the con- 
trary, it suffers from it; and when from 
its love for virtue it corrects the inclina- 
tion, strong as it may be, the heart cer- 
tainly does not become the worse for the 
effort 

This resistance to temptation shows a 
Christian heart, displays its attachment to 
God, the protection which He affords it, 
and is a source of consolation and con- 
fidence. This resolution to resist the in- 
clination that solicits it, comes from the 
divine goodness which furnishes it graces 
all the more powerful in proportion to its 
danger. It is poor reasoning to say : if my 
mind and heart were in a good condition 
and well with God, should I have these 
thoughts and feelings so opposed to faith, 



TEMPTATIONS IN REGARD TO GOD. 207 

to submission, to patience, which cause me 
such horror ? 

If these thoughts and feelings depended 
solely on your will, to have them, or not, 
you might, with some show of reason, 
deem yourself at enmity with God when 
you recognize their presence. But it does 
not wholly depend on yourself. These 
thoughts and feelings insinuate themselves 
silently, or violently possess themselves of 
your mind and heart without consulting 
your will, and what is more, they endure 
in spite of your will which would free it- 
self of them, and uses every means for their 
expulsion. They are not, therefore, the 
result of your free will, they are not of 
your choosing, and they can decide nothing 
concerning the good state of your soul, or 
against its union with God and virtue. 

The heart becomes attached to an ob- 
ject only through deliberation and volun- 



208 TEMPTATIONS IN REGARD TO GOD. 

tary action. It can, therefore, belong to 
God, although it is exposed to involuntary 
feelings which are contrary to virtue, and 
which it condemns. I may say more ; the 
pain that it feels, the horror which it con- 
ceives at being thus assailed, are a decisive 
proof that it is faithful to its duty and to 
divine love. If it loved God less, if it 
feared and hated sin less, it would not ex- 
perience this pain, and trouble, and horror, 
it would listen to its inclinations and sat- 
isfy its desires. It cannot have any surer 
mark of its love for God and the persever- 
ance which He gives it in opposing its 
evil inclinations. 

The greatest saints have been subjected 
to this trial (St. Paul amongst others) and 
yet they loved God very much. Our di- 
vine Saviour, the Saint of saints, suffered 
Himself to be tempted for our instruction. 
That which He willed to bear in His sacred 



RECOURSE TO GOD. 209 

humanity could be neither a sin nor even 
an imperfection, for He was as incapable 
of the one as of the other. We cannot 
then be guilty when we suffer it as He 
did, resisting it according to the measure 
of our strength. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

IN TEMPTATION RECOURSE MUST BE HAD TO 
GOD. HE SUSTAINS US IN THE COMBAT AL- 
THOUGH WE DO NOT PERCEIVE IT. 

God sometimes sensibly guides the soul 
in these storms by which it is agitated. 
We then buffet courageously the impetu- 
ous flood of our passions. The vivid 
sense of God's presence, the desire of lov- 
ing Him which we feel, animate us and 
inspire us with confidence. But sometimes 
He conceals Himself; He seems to sleep, 



2io RECOURSE TO GOD. 

as He did in the bark of the disciples 
when it was on the point of being sub- 
merged in the raging sea. On such occa- 
sions the soul is endangered by the 
excessive fear that seizes and paralyzes 
the heart. 

And yet there is nothing to fear if you 
will only lift your eyes to heaven, from 
which succor must come, and if you make 
use of its assistance. When the disciples 
were in danger of perishing they lost no 
time in useless lamentation ; they did not, 
in childish fear, give up all care of the ship; 
they strove manfully with the storm and 
turning to their Master they implored His 
help. Jesus seemed asleep (Matt. viii. 
24) and yet He directed, without their 
being aware of it, the means which they 
employed to escape shipwreck. So, too, 
God, concealed as He is from sight, is not 
the less attentive to what is passing in 



RECOURSE TO GOD. 211 

your heart. To you it seems that the 
next moment will bring the wreck and yet 
you make head against the storm. 

The motives that inspire you, the feel- 
ings which animate you and prompt your 
actions almost without your perceiving it, 
the courage which, ever on the point of 
failing, is always reviving, the constancy 
with which you reject deceitful pleasures, 
the sinful pleasures offered by the enemy 
— from whom do they come ? From your- 
self ? Weak as you are is this resistance 
yours alone? Does it not come from Jesus 
Christ, who, without making Himself per- 
ceived, affords you His powerful support, 
according to His word that He would not 
" suffer you to be tempted above that which 
you are able" (1 Cor. x. 13). Yes, when 
you think Him farthest off, Jesus is in the 
midst of your heart. You think yourself 
forgotten, and you are more than ever 



212 CONSENTING TO TEMPTATION. 

present to His memory, because you are in 
need. He is present at your combats as 
He was at that of St. Stephen (Acts vii. 55) 
and, provided you do not lose confidence, 
He will make you victorious over your ene- 
mies by preserving you from consenting to 
their wicked designs. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

HOW TO RECOGNIZE WHETHER WE HAVE CON- 
SENTED TO THE TEMPTATION. 

We have not much difficulty in seeing 
that temptation is no evil and that consent 
alone makes the sin. That which troubles 
and disquiets those whom God subjects 
to this painful trial, is the fear of offend- 
ing God and their ignorance of the 
principles by which they may reassure 
themselves, not being able to distinguish 



CONSENTING TO TEMPTATION. 213 

between temptation and consenting to 
temptation. This uncertainty as to their 
consent fills them with an anxiety which 
causes them great suffering, destroys their 
interior peace, and so weakens their con- 
fidence as to prevent them from approach- 
ing God freely and with confidence, and, 
in fine, throws them into an extreme 
despondency, utterly prostrating their 
strength. A few reflections would suf- 
fice to clear their doubts and enable them 
to come to a right decision. 

We have not a complete command 
over our mind and our heart. We can- 
not wholly prevent the intrusions of cer- 
tain thoughts and feelings. Sometimes 
indeed they take such forcible possession 
of us, that we are led to pursue in spirit 
without perceiving it the thought or 
design that thus presents itself. Our 
preoccupation is so great that we hear 



214 CONSENTING TO TEMPTATION. 

and see nothing of what is passing 
around ; we do not even remember how 
or when these thoughts or feelings com- 
menced. Thus we often suddenly find 
ourselves, to our surprise, engaged in 
thoughts and feelings that are opposed 
to charity or to other virtues ; in projects 
of vanity, pride, or self-love. 

This state continues a longer or a 
shorter time, according to the strength 
of the imagination or the sensible im- 
pression that occasioned it, or until some 
circumstance arises to awaken the soul 
from this apparent enchantment. We 
then perceive, by reflection, the nature of 
our thoughts. If in this moment of self- 
consciousness, we condemn the thought 
or feeling, if we disavow it and strive to 
reject it, we may safely say that in all 
that went before we were not to blame. 
The satisfaction which we experience in 



CONSENTING TO TEMPTATION. 215 

being freed from it is a fresh proof 
that our will had no part in our revery. 
In this preoccupation there was no 
deliberation, no choice on the part of 
the will. In order to offend God it is 
necessary that the will should deliberately 
consent to something sinful which it is 
free to reject. In the case we have sup- 
posed, there was neither freedom nor de- 
liberation, hence there could be no sin. 
Moreover, the promptness of their rejec- 
tion, when consciousness returned, showed 
the good dispositions of the soul and 
that it would not have admitted these 
thoughts and feelings, still less have 
dwelt on them, had reflection furnished 
the opportunity of accepting or rejecting 
them at will. We must then consider 
these temptations as beginning only when 
we became conscious of their presence. 
It is to this moment, therefore, that our 



216 CONSENTING TO TEMPTATION. 

examination must be directed, and if we 
rejected them at that time, we may be at 
peace. 

This abstraction may continue for a 
long time, as often happens at prayer, 
where we are carried away by distrac- 
tions that entirely absorb the soul. This 
circumstance does not make it voluntary 
or deliberate. It no more depends on 
our will to shorten the distraction then, 
than it does to prevent it from coming 
at all; there is no more choice in the 
one than in the other. There will be 
no more sin either, for as the preoccupa- 
tion which comes unforeseen is blame- 
less, so the length of time in which it 
remains unperceived cannot make it cul- 
pable. There should be no difficulty, 
therefore, in deciding these cases. 



PASSING TEMPTATIONS. 217 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

ON SHORT AND PASSING TEMPTATIONS. 

Temptations are generally perceived 
at once or soon after they present them- 
selves, and may differ in kind. Some- 
times they are thoughts or feelings which 
arise suddenly, and as quickly pass away. 
In such a case we. are sometimes at a 
loss to determine whether it was merely 
a temptation or whether there was not 
sin. Its duration was so short that al- 
though we turned away from it, we are 
unable to decide whether it was quickly 
enough to prevent consent. 

In such circumstances we may base 
our decision upon our ordinary senti- 
ments and conduct. If we esteem, love, 
and zealously practise the virtues against 
which these temptations are directed; if 



2i 8 PASSING TEMPTATIONS. 

in our habitual disposition we are free 
from any voluntary sin against these 
virtues ; if in longer and more sustained 
temptations of the kind we have been 
victorious in the struggle, we may pru- 
dently judge that those fleeting thoughts 
and feelings were merely temptations and 
not sins; and that the rejection which ban- 
ished them had really forestalled consent 
The reason is, that when we act con- 
trary to our habitual disposition, we must 
use a certain violence which we cannot 
but perceive. If, then, we are habitually 
such as I have supposed, our consent to 
the temptation would not be a matter of 
ignorance or of doubt. The impression 
which such a consent would have made, 
although but passing, would have caused 
itself to be felt. We may reassure our- 
selves, then, from the very fact that we 
are not certain of having yielded to the 



PASSING TEMPTATIONS. 219 

temptation. Our doubt itself proves that 
we may be certain, for had we really 
consented we should not doubt. 

All those who prescribe rules for persons 
who are troubled by temptations are unan- 
imous in advising them to despise these 
passing thoughts and to pay as little 
attention to them as possible. The reason 
which they give is the result of experience, 
which teaches us that if we neglect them 
and pass them by in occupying ourselves 
with other things, they leave no impres- 
sion and return less frequently, or not at 
all ; but, on the contrary, that if we attack 
them violently, if we subject them to a 
strict examination, and especially if we 
allow them to frighten us, we are only 
recalling what is already gone, we stop 
them and give them strength in the pause 
which we force them to make in our 
mind. That which, had we despised it, 



220 PASSING TEMPTATIONS. 

would have been but as a passing shadow 
or a fleeting gleam of lightning, becomes 
by the attention we give it a devouring 
flame in our heart. It becomes an in- 
trenched enemy, obstinate in the combat 
and dangerous to the soul. 

Temptation is like a coward who seeks 
to feel his adversary. If he meets with 
undisguised contempt or firm resistance, 
he does not push the quarrel, and retires. 
But if he encounters timid compromise 
or coward fear, he takes advantage of 
the weakness, attacks with violence, and 
obliges his enemy to submit to his terms. 
We must, then, allow all such temptations 
to pass lightly by and reserve our atten- 
tion for useful objects. If when these 
thoughts arise we simply turn our heart 
to God in some aspiration of love and 
piety, they will be unable to do us any 
harm. 



PERSISTENT TEMPT ATJONS. 221 

CHAPTER XXX. 

ON TEMPTATIONS WHICH ARE PERSISTENT AND 
TROUBLESOME, AND ON THOSE WHICH MAKE 
AN IMPRESSION ON OUR SENSES. 

Ordinarily, temptations are not so 
easily vanquished and their attack is 
strong and continued. If they cease for a 
while, it is only to return to the charge. 
And as they agitate both mind and heart, 
a timid soul is apt to fear a sin in feelings 
which we so frequently experience and 
which seem to maintain a fixed dwelling 
in the bosom. The fear thus excited 
increases the feeling; the agitation in 
which the soul finds itself, the failure of 
its efforts to overcome the trouble, give 
rise to a despondency more dangerous 
than the temptation itself, since it takes 
away the strength which is required for 
successful resistance. 



222 PERSISTENT TEMPTATIONS. 

Our conduct during the presence of the 
temptation may serve to determine whether 
we are deserving of blame. And in the 
first place, to prevent ourselves from being 
overcome by doubts which are dangerous 
and unreasonable, we should return to the 
principles which we first established. The 
feeling which is experienced in the 
moment of temptation is not in itself a 
voluntary consent. It is only the bait with 
which the enemy hopes to gain the con- 
sent. He presents the object to the mind 
or fancy; that is a thought. He renders 
it pleasing to the desires or passions ; 
that is a feeling, which is the natural con- 
sequence of the representation of the ob- 
ject. This feeling is more or less vivid 
according to the temperament of the 
individual and the impression caused by 
the object. But all this is independent of 
the will and precedes the consent. 



PERSISTENT TEMPTATIONS. 223 

To produce the consent it is necessary 
that the will should deliberately adhere to 
this feeling, that it should approve it, 
attach itself to it, and agree to it. An 
idea may dwell in the mind, a feeling may 
exist in the heart, without being adopted 
by the will. It is thus that we resist or 
reject the inspirations of the good spirit, 
as well as those of the bad. This first 
thought, then, or feeling, which only pro- 
poses an object to our will, no more con- 
stitutes a sin than it does a virtue, since 
these consist in the choice which is made 
by the will in finally attaching itself to 
either. 

If then the soul, in the time of tempta- 
tion, had recourse to God for the grace of 
which it stood in need; if it renounced 
the feeling which was opposed to virtue, if 
it disapproved and rejected it, and abhorred 
all that the temptation proposed ; if it 



224 PERSISTENT TEMPTATIONS. 

sought to turn away the thought by fixing 
the mind on some proper or useful object ; 
then, even though it cannot answer with 
certainty for its fidelity during each instant 
of the continuance of the trial, it may 
safely judge that all that it experienced, 
no matter how violent it appeared to be 
or how long continued, was simply and 
merely a temptation in which there was 
no fault. 

God does not permit the soul to be 
tempted beyond its strength, as the Holy 
Ghost teaches us : " God is faithful, who 
will not suffer you to be tempted above that 
which you are able, but will make also with 
temptation issue, that you may be able to 
bear it " (i Cor. x. 1 3). He is never wanting 
to the one who does all he can to avoid 
sin. And it is certain that when we em- 
ploy the means which religion and ex- 
perience point out, we cannot reproach 



PERSISTENT TEMPTATIONS. 225 

ourselves with negligence. We must 
then encourage the hope that He, who in 
His mercy gave us the fidelity to use the 
proper means, has also, according to His 
promise preserved us from falling. This 
reasoning must silence the anxious doubts 
and fears which may arise when God has 
caused the calm to succeed the storm. 

The temptation may be strong enough 
to excite bad impressions on our senses. 
They should not alarm us. What we have 
said of feelings or sentiments is equally 
applicable to impressions or sensations. 
Sensible impressions do not depend on 
the will, which, not having the power to 
stop or to banish them, is not responsible 
for their commencement or their persist- 
ence. In such circumstances there is no 
sin save in their approval or acceptance. 
So long as we regard them as the con- 
sequence of a temptation which we 



226 PERSISTENT TEMPTATIONS. 

combat and condemn, we do not approve 
them and are not to blame. These im- 
pressions or sensations would only in- 
crease, were we to attend to them and 
vainly strive to banish them. Since they 
are not sins we must not allow them to 
trouble us. Our attention must be di- 
rected solely to driving away from the 
mind and the heart the temptation that 
causes them and to guarding against 
the consent which it solicits. 



TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US. 227 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

ON TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US IN THE 
EXERCISE OF VIRTUES. WE MUST NOT ABAN- 
DON A GOOD WORK BECAUSE OF THE DEFECT 
OR THE IMPERFECT MOTIVE WHICH ACCOM- 
PANIES IT. WE MUST RENOUNCE THE ONE 
AND PERSEVERE IN THE OTHER. 

All these principles will serve to sus- 
tain and encourage the soul in certain 
temptations which are experienced in the 
exercise of virtue. There are persons to 
whom the enemy does not dare to pro- 
pose the abandonment of those virtues 
which lead to perfection; but he makes 
use of artifice to restrain them and to 
fix them in a mediocrity that degener- 
ates into negligence. When not en- 
gaged in spiritual exercises he leaves 
them alone, but no sooner do they apply 
themselves to these than he fills their 



228 TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US. 

imagination with a thousand ideas that 
disturb them. 

In those who aspire to lead a life of 
perfection, without being deterred there- 
from either by human respect or by the 
fear of the sacrifices which it entails, he 
inspires a secret pride in the fulfilment 
of their duties. This thought insinuates 
itself into all their occupations. It seems 
to them as though in everything they 
sought the vain esteem of men or their 
own self-satisfaction. 

These temptations are so powerful in 
some as to discourage and altogether 
disconcert them. Possessed with the 
idea that on account of a want of purity 
of intention all their sacrifice is without 
fruit and without reward, they prefer to 
resist the inspirations of heaven, they 
interrupt their exercises of piety, and 
lead a life filled with imperfections and 



TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US. 229 

with faults. Through a dread of the 
struggle in which they must engage, 
they omit the good works which God 
inspires, and thus in avoiding one snare 
they fall into another. 

If the temptation arises from useless 
occupations in which we engage, or from 
dangerous occasions not required by our 
state of life, there can be no doubt that 
we should abandon them in order to se- 
cure ourselves; but, on the other hand, 
it is equally certain that we must not, 
through fear of temptation, fail to per- 
form our duty and follow the guidance 
of the Spirit of God. Temptation is not 
of itself an evil, whereas it is surely an 
evil to be wanting in our duty in that 
which God requires. If we allow our- 
selves to be influenced by this fear and 
on that account abandon our exercises 
of piety or the profit which attends a 



230 TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US. 

spirit of sacrifice, we are wanting in fidel- 
ity to grace ; we deprive ourselves of that 
assistance which would enable us to ad- 
vance in perfection ; we place in the hand 
of our enemy a certain means of causing 
us to abandon successively all that we 
are bound to perform. He will take ad- 
vantage of this empire which he is 
allowed to acquire, of this fear which 
he has succeeded in inspiring, and will 
lead us by degrees to the neglect of the 
practices of religion, of the sacraments, 
of all that nourishes piety. Will a soul 
in such a state, without strength, with- 
out courage, afraid to seek in prayer 
and mortification the means of support, 
be able to resist successfully the assault 
of its enemy? 

Let us not then fear such temptations, 
since, as we have often said, the fault is 
not in them, but in our consenting to 



TEMPTATIONS WHICH DISTURB US. 231 

the evil which they propose. Those 
which are more enduring we must en- 
counter with confidence and love of 
God. Those which are but passing 
thoughts, no matter how frequent, we 
must despise and forget, renewing our 
intention of doing the will of God in all 
our actions. Then such temptations will 
bring with them no imperfections; they 
will even do us good, since they will 
cause a more frequent purifying of our 
intention. Thus shall good come from 
evil and from a snare designed for our 
destruction we shall derive a means for 
our sanctification. 



2 3 2 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

TEMPTATIONS NOT TO BE REASONED WITH. MEANS 
OF BANISHING THEM. 

There are certain passions which we 
can vanquish only by a direct attack ; 
that is, by doing the reverse of what they 
suggest. Those which form the leading 
points of an unsubdued nature are of 
this number. They who are subject to 
vanity, anger, susceptibility, and to quick 
and strong prejudices, can surmount these 
passions only by practising on occasion 
the virtues which are directly opposed to 
them. They must not be satisfied with 
renouncing the feelings which those pas- 
sions inspire, but they must mortify them 
by producing the opposite sentiments. If 
they seek only to avoid the occasions of 
their faults they will not succeed in 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 233 

destroying the passion, and when they 
can no longer avoid the occasion, they 
will be almost certain to fall. It is by 
practising humility, meekness, by self-re- 
nunciation, and by attentions to those 
against whom we have a prejudice, that 
we give to those passions efficacious blows, 
insure their defeat and the complete 
victory of him who is faithful in resisting 
every attack. 

On the other hand, nothing is more 
damaging than the conduct of certain 
persons in the time of temptation. They 
believe that they are guilty of a fault in 
case they fail to exhaust themselves in 
reasoning down the suggestions of the 
temptation. They enter into a discussion 
with the passion that attacks them, and 
which is never without a specious reason 
for its justification. They engage in a 
combat that is long and doubtful, and that 



234 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

need not have lasted a minute if they had 
refused to argue with their wily enemy — 
or which, at least, would have given them 
much less trouble to surmount. This is 
especially the case in temptations against 
faith and hope, or in sentiments opposed 
to charity. They wish to assure them- 
selves of their interior dispositions by 
going directly against the temptation, and 
they only involve themselves in trouble- 
some doubts and perplexities, and uselessly 
expose themselves to peril. 

So soon as we reason w r ith the tempta- 
tion, particularly in difficult matters or 
where difficulties are easily excited and 
hard to answer for those who are not well 
informed in such matters, or in things 
which appeal to self-love, and which our 
natural malice approves, we are in the 
greatest danger of defeat. So it was that 
Eve fell. 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 235 

Temptations that enter the soul through 
the senses and which offer a satisfaction 
that is in conformity with nature cause 
a very strong impression. That which 
we oppose to it, not being appreciable to 
the senses nor affecting our nature, 
makes much less impression, unless, in- 
deed, it be strengthened by a very vivid 
faith. In the midst of our trouble, faith 
has frequently a difficulty in making it- 
self heard and our resistance to the pas- 
sion becomes very weak. Besides, in 
this sort of defence, the attention we give 
to the temptation keeps it alive and makes 
it more felt, so that every instant it seems 
to us that we have yielded our consent 
to its suggestions, and we become so 
troubled and dismayed as to be unable 
afterward to give a satisfactory account 
of our conduct. 

In all such temptations, there is no 



236 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

surer way of defending ourselves than 
simply to banish the thought by occupy- 
ing our minds with some pious senti- 
ment. If thoughts can intrude themselves 
without the consent of the will, the latter, 
on the other hand, can indirectly expel 
them by obliging the mind to occupy it- 
self with other objects. Nor is it neces- 
sary to select for this purpose such as 
are opposed to the temptation which 
assails us, it being sufficient to disavow 
or reject it by entertaining any thought 
or any act of virtue that may distract 
our attention, selecting in preference 
those which are to us most familiar or 
most striking. 

Some, easily moved by the sufferings 
of the God become man for our sake, 
place themselves at the foot of the cross 
of Jesus Christ who by the sacrifice of 
His life expiated our sins ; there they con- 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 237 

ceive a new sorrow for their faults and 
omissions, and a new horror for what- 
ever might crucify again in their hearts 
their dear Lord and Master. Others, in 
imagination, fly for refuge within the 
Sacred Heart of Jesus, imploring His 
mercy and protection, and by penetrat- 
ing into His goodness and compassion 
for them, excite within themselves a 
gratitude and a confidence that insure 
their fidelity. These, moved especially 
by the love displayed by Jesus in giving 
Himself to them in the Holy Eucharist, 
make use of the sentiments inspired by 
His infinite mercy to withdraw their 
heart from everything that might offend 
so good a Lord. Those, imagining them- 
selves at the moment in which they will 
be called upon to render an account to 
God, dwell upon the thought of heaven 
and hell. They ask themselves, "If I 



2 3 8 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

were just about to appear before the 
tribunal of Jesus Christ, how should I 
then wish to have acted?" Occupying 
themselves earnestly with these objects 
so interesting to the Christian and so 
capable of withdrawing man from sin, 
penetrated with truths at once so touch- 
ing, so striking, their hearts become in- 
sensible to the temptation and their 
minds cease to entertain the thought. 

There are few temptations that can 
persist long in the soul who, refusing to 
listen to or discuss the imaginary reasons 
of passion and animated by a lively con- 
fidence, turns to God in loving trust 
and implores His help through the in- 
tercession of the Blessed Virgin. This 
exercise of love for God, during the 
continuance of the temptation, is the best 
safeguard of the heart. It can never be 
overcome so long as it sustains this 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 



*39 



sentiment To render it stronger and 
more enduring the mind should recall 
the motives that are apt to nourish and 
increase it; the enemy will soon retire 
in confusion. A renewal of the attack 
should be met with the same defence. 

It is desirable next to banish entirely 
from the mind and heart the ideas and 
feelings which beget the danger. We 
shall do it most readily and surely by en- 
gaging ourselves in some other thoughts 
or occupations. Indeed there are occa- 
sions, especially when the temptation is 
unusually strong and obstinate, where it 
is desirable to take up some entertain- 
ing author, to engage in some bodily 
exercise, or to occupy ourselves earnestly 
in business or the discharge of our 
household duties. Such occupations fix 
the attention and free the mind from 
the seductive pictures of the imagina- 



240 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

tion. When peace and calm have re- 
turned, the mind and heart will be more 
at liberty to think of God and to attach 
themselves to Him more closely. 

A capital point in these combats is 
the not allowing ourselves to be troubled, 
or to relax our confidence, and especially 
to resist the very first attack. When we 
are disturbed by fear we know not where 
to turn for assistance, being, in a man- 
ner, struck with blindness. We do not 
think of seeking assistance; the heart 
knows not on what to resolve, since the 
intellect presents nothing to prompt its 
action. We may verify this in our daily 
experience, as well in temporal as in 
spiritual things. How often have we 
not beheld a man in sudden danger, pal- 
sied by fear, lose his presence of mind; 
in vain is a help tendered to him, he 
cannot see it; he has safety at hand, 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 241 

and in seeking it, he turns his back 
upon it. 

Show a bold front to the enemy and 
you can then take surer measures to 
parry his blows, you will more readily 
perceive the means of conquering, and 
being more at ease, you will employ 
them with greater confidence. And, 
once more, what cause is there for fear? 
The devil can indeed suggest the most 
horrible sins, but can he oblige you to 
consent to them ? That depends on 
your will, not on his. Why then be 
frightened at a result which lies com- 
pletely at your own disposal? Why fear 
a consent, which, with the assured assist- 
ance of grace you can certainly refuse? 
Stand firm and you have nothing to 
fear from an enemy who can only con- 
quer by your permission. 

This courage will spring from your 



242 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

confidence in God, which you must be 
careful to sustain. When one is dis- 
couraged in temptation, he is already 
half overcome. His efforts are feeble, 
because unsupported by those graces 
which confidence attracts. How should 
they be granted when, through fear, 
there is no thought of imploring them? 
He no longer considers the goodness 
and power of a God who is able and 
willing to defend His child. And yet 
were he to ask with trusting faith, that 
power and goodness would be soon 
made manifest. The confidence of the 
Royal Psalmist should be his: u f will 
call upon the Lord ; and I shall be saved 
from my enemies" (Ps. xvii. 4). 

"But," you may say, "how often have 
I not experienced my weakness in this 
temptation?" Yes, because you have 
always been wanting in confidence. Be 



BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 243 

firm then, and you will never fall. St. 
Peter, walking on the waters at the com- 
mand of Jesus Christ, began to sink so 
soon as he commenced to doubt ; he was 
saved only by a return to confidence, 
which gained for him the protection of 
his divine Master. 

In temptations, especially in those 
which are generally violent, be on your 
guard at the first attack and try to re- 
press its first motions. If, by a feeble 
defence, you allow the imagination to 
become excited and the heart to be oc- 
cupied, your negligence will serve to 
increase your weakness. A passion that 
is trifled with soon gains the upper hand. 
It was only a spark, easily extinguished ; 
it becomes a flame which consumes all 
the faculties of the soul. This advice is 
the more necessary in those temptations 
that are increased in violence by the 



244 BANISHING TEMPTATIONS. 

impression which they make on the 
senses. A special mercy is then required 
to preserve us unharmed amidst the 
flames. Diligence in meeting the dan- 
ger would either have preserved you from 
the temptation or would have assured 
you the protection of God, whereby you 
would have escaped without a wound. 

When anything occurs that is strange 
to our experience we should at once con- 
sult our confessor, and make known to 
him the new temptation. He will teach 
us what means we must employ to resist 
and banish the adversary. This act of 
humility and Christian simplicity draws 
down special graces from heaven. Our 
Lord takes a special interest in the 
troubles of those who, according to the 
order of divine providence, seek to walk 
in the paths of obedience. It often hap- 
pens that such temptations never attack 



FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 245 

us a second time, when revealed at once 
to the minister of God. If we conceal 
them in the hope that they will disappear, 
they gain time to fortify themselves and 
become more difficult to overcome. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

ON FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. " IN TIME OF 
PEACE, PREPARE FOR WAR." 

When we are subject to frequent temp- 
tations, we must employ the intervals 
of attack in preparing ourselves and in 
gathering strength to resist. He who 
would make himself ready only when 
assailed is easily surprised and readily 
defeated. " In time of peace, prepare for 
war," is a well-known maxim. We should 
not neglect its warning in our spiritual 
combats, where defeat is so much more 



246 FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 

important than in temporal affairs, since 
thereby we are deprived of an eternal 
kingdom. 

This preparation consists in leading a 
life of recollection. When we are lead- 
ing a gay and distracted life we do not 
pay proper attention to what is passing 
in our heart. Temptations advance very 
far before we find ourselves roused to a 
sense of danger. The mind being oc- 
cupied with light and trifling things, finds 
a difficulty in reflecting seriously on the 
motives which religion offers to counter- 
act the solicitations of passion. But in 
interior recollection, occupied with God 
and holy things, we see the enemy from 
afar; we use the proper precautions, and 
we find in our habitual thoughts and feel- 
ings sufficient weapons for a successful 
defence. The mind occupied with the 
truths of faith, the heart habitually at- 



FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 247 

tached to virtue, are not so easily shaken 
by the false allurements of passion. The 
torch of faith reveals the depth of the 
precipice to which the temptation leads, 
and, filled with horror, we withdraw from 
the slippery descent. Assiduous prayer, 
the invocation of the saints, and particu- 
larly of the Mother of God, open to us 
the treasures of heaven and procure for 
us those chosen graces for which the dissi- 
pated soul does not even think of asking. 
If this recollected life be accompanied 
by a careful frequentation of the sacra- 
ments, we shall be still more secure. 
And even though we sometimes yield to 
temptation, we should not therefore with- 
draw from the sacraments, but on the 
contrary, approach them more frequently. 
The Sacrament of Penance was estab- 
lished not only for the remission of actual 
sins, but also for conferring graces which 



248 FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 

may withhold us from others that we 
might commit and fortify us against the 
passions which lead us into sin. 

In abstaining from the sacraments, 
then, we deprive ourselves of these graces 
and diminish our capacity for resistance. 
The more frequently we approach the 
Sacrament of Penance, the greater is the 
horror which we conceive for sin. This 
horror, frequently renewed, becomes more 
rooted in the soul, more vivid in its effects, 
and fortifies it more powerfully in the 
moment of danger. Moreover, all the 
theologians unite in saying that when a 
person who is very much inclined to 
mortal sin has had the misfortune to fall, 
he should lose no time in being recon- 
ciled, since, being separated from God 
and deprived of sanctifying grace, he 
remains in the greatest danger of com- 
mitting the sin again, on a recurrence 



FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 249 

of the temptation. It is therefore very 
prejudicial to delay having recourse to the 
Sacrament of Penance, and still more 
so to abandon it altogether, or for a 
time. 

The holy communion, when we ap- 
proach it after suitable preparation, is 
also a very powerful aid against tempta- 
tion. We there receive Jesus Christ, the 
Saviour of souls. After having given 
Himself to us can we believe that He 
will refuse the graces which are necessary 
to preserve us in union with Him ? If 
He enters our heart, is it not that He 
may confirm it in virtue? The Holy 
Council of Trent, speaking of the Holy 
Eucharist, says : "Jesus Christ desired that 
this Sacrament should be received as the 
spiritual food of souls, that it should 
nourish and strengthen them, . . . and 
should be an antidote by which we should 



250 FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 

be delivered from our daily faults and 
preserved from mortal sins " (Sess. xiii. 
c. 2). If there be any time in which we 
have pressing need of help to confirm 
us in virtue, to strengthen us against the 
enemy of salvation, to preserve us from 
mortal sin, it is certainly when we are 
the object of frequent temptations. The 
celestial food, the powerful antidote, is 
never more needed. To deprive ourselves 
voluntarily of that assistance provided for 
such emergencies would be to court peril 
and tempt our weakness. Besides, when 
preparing ourselves for the Blessed Sac- 
rament we are absorbed in the thoughts 
suggested by the great event; our heart, 
occupied by the sentiments of piety which 
it strives to excite, recoils from tempta- 
tion and is attentive to exclude everything 
that may diminish the graces which it 
solicits. But of this point the confessor 



FREQUENT TEMPTATIONS. 251 

is the proper judge ; it is for him to pre- 
scribe what is to be done, lest in this we 
should be guided by illusions. 

To all these safeguards against the 
temptations to which we are exposed, we 
may add the exercise of penance. It 
obtains new graces ; it humbles the spirit ; 
it deadens the passions; it expiates our 
sins, our faults and negligences ; it excites 
our fervor, and redoubles our vigilance. 
In this, however, there is need of discre- 
tion and judgment. We must not carry 
our mortification too far, for then it would 
be an excess and prejudicial to our health, 
which Christian prudence commands us 
to preserve. The practice of mortification 
is beneficial against nearly all the pas- 
sions ; but there are temptations in which 
it may be hurtful to some persons, accord- 
ing to their character and temperament. 
To such, mortification must be forbidden, 



252 UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 

and they must do nothing of the kind, 
save by counsel and permission. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

THE UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 

If temptations render us so unhappy, it 
is because we do not look upon them from 
the right point of view. We consider only 
the danger to which we are exposed, the 
evil to which we are drawn ; we lose sight 
of the advantages which they confer, of 
the spiritual benefit which they can pro- 
cure. This ignorance, or this want of 
reflection, accounts for the little profit 
which we derive from these trials. The 
following considerations will serve to make 
us bear them more patiently and will give 
us greater facility in overcoming them. 



UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 253 

Temptations may be made to lead a 
Christian heart to the practice of the most 
solid virtues and to the acquisition of 
great merits in heaven. It is a great 
consolation to think that we can derive 
advantages from the very enemies that 
assail us and make them contribute to our 
happiness. Surely this thought should 
animate us in the hour of combat. It is 
the motive proposed to us by the apostle 
St. James : " Esteem it, my brethren, all joy, 
when you shall fall into divers temptations" 
(i. 2), and he at once assigns the reason, 
" knowing that the trying of your faith 
worketh patience'' and patience, he adds, 
worketh perfection. 

Man does not sufficiently reflect upon 
himself; he does not know himself; he 
avoids self-examination lest perchance 
he should recognize faults which would 
cause him to blush. All his attention is 



254 UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 

engaged in endeavoring to excuse his sins 
to himself, and to exaggerate his good 
qualities. From this foolish conduct 
spring that self-love so delicate, so sensi- 
tive, so touchy; that self-esteem and pre- 
sumption which expose him to so many 
dangers ; that vanity, that preference 
which he gives himself over others. 
Pride, the source of all evils, blinds him 
to his defects, to his falls, and to his weak- 
ness. Even pious persons are not exempt 
from this self-complacency, this dwelling 
on one's virtues, this hunger for esteem, 
which are so natural to man. It is a 
secret spring of pride and vanity, which 
exalts them in their own eyes, puffs them 
up with satisfaction, leads them to rely on 
their own strength, and keeps them in a 
rash and dangerous feeling of security. 
It is a subtle poison that infects actions 
which are, in appearance, most holy. 



UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 255 

Temptations are a sovereign remedy 
against this dangerous evil and its perni- 
cious consequences. They reveal to man 
the interior of his own heart ; they show 
him what he is when left to himself ; they 
tear away all concealment and all disguise. 
By the light of their gloomy torch he sees 
his misery, his weakness, his corruption. 
Attacked alternately by the different pas- 
sions, by envy, jealousy, hatred, vengeance, 
and by others, lower yet and more degrad- 
ing, he sees in his heart the germs of all 
those disorders into which others have 
fallen and he is at last persuaded that his 
nature is not superior to theirs. 

The first effect produced in us by such 
a sight, is to inspire a humility propor- 
tioned to the misery which is thereby made 
known to us, where there is subject only 
for humility and contempt. The compla- 
cency which we might feel at the sight of 



256 UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 

certain good qualities which we possess, 
is soon lowered by that crowd of evil in- 
clinations against which we must wage 
unceasing warfare. We see ourselves 
such as we should appear to men were our 
heart with all its passions unveiled to their 
contemplation. We feel for ourselves a 
Christian contempt, humility before God, 
and, at least, equality with other men. 

What advantages could we not derive 
from this self-knowledge accompanied by 
the spirit of religion ? Are we suffering — 
submissive to the designs of providence, 
we acknowledge that God is lenient to- 
ward us and does not treat us as the 
corruption of our heart deserves. Are we 
happy and consoled — we adore the good- 
ness of God who is so indulgent to His 
unworthy creature. The contrast of our 
unworthiness and the divine goodness, ex- 
cites the most lively gratitude and inspires 



UTILITY OF TEMPTATIONS. 257 

a more perfect love. With the convic- 
tion that we are unworthy of the bene- 
fits which we receive at His hands and 
which flow from His infinite mercy, we 
strive to deepen still more our humility, 
that virtue at once so necessary and the 
mother of so many other virtues. 

One to whom temptations have re- 
vealed all the corruption of his heart, 
experiences, alone with God, the same 
confusion which he would suffer before 
men to whom it should be known. It is 
a salutary confusion which should be pre- 
served. Hereafter, guided by the spirit 
of religion, he will not be irritated by the 
conduct of others, rough and disagreeable 
though it be. The light of faith shows 
him that he merits even more contempt 
than he receives, and if he does not 
meet with more, it is because he is not 
thoroughly known to others, or their 



258 GREATER VIGILANCE. 

charity blinds them to that which they 
might otherwise perceive. Is anything 
more needed to destroy forever his self- 
complacency and esteem ? 



CHAPTER XXXV. 

THE SUBJECT CONTINUED. ONE WHO IS SUBJECT 
TO TEMPTATIONS AND DESIROUS OF SAVING HIS 
SOUL, ATTACHES HIMSELF THE MORE CLOSELY 
TO GOD AND EXERCISES THE GREATER VIGI- 
LANCE. 

The knowledge that temptations give 
of the interior produces another effect 
which rightly followed up leads to per- 
fection. One who is subject to tempta- 
tions and yet desirous of being saved 
attaches himself more closely to God and 
is excited to greater vigilance over him- 



GREATER VIGILANCE. 259 

self — two great means of advancing 
rapidly in the path of sanctity. 

He sees in his heart a number of ene- 
mies, he knows his own weakness ; and 
although he feels that with ordinary grace 
he has sufficient resolution to overcome 
some, yet against others to which he is 
more violently drawn and in certain oc- 
casions of greater peril, he is convinced 
from his own weakness, from a sorrowful 
experience, and from a knowledge of the 
principles of his religion, that without 
special graces, he will not have the cour- 
age to resist successfully. Knowing these 
things and alarmed at the unequal strug- 
gle, what is he to do? He must seek 
help powerful enough to sustain him 
against his enemies and particularly 
against those whom he most fears. Faith 
teaches him that this assistance is to be 
found only in God, and that to obtain it 



260 GREATER VIGILANCE. 

he has only to implore it fervently and 
perseveringly. To Him then does he 
turn with entire confidence. 

At the first movement of the tempta- 
tion, he says with the Psalmist, "/ have 
lifted up my eyes to the mountains from 
whence help shall come to me" (Ps. cxx. i); 
he solicits it by his prayers ; he attracts it 
by his desires; all the aspirations of his 
heart are eloquent to obtain it. The more 
the temptation presses him, the more he 
attaches himself to God. He is like a 
child walking along the margin of fear- 
ful precipices or surrounded by ferocious 
beasts of prey ; he clings to his Father for 
protection whenever the path grows slip- 
pery and dangerous, or when the fierce 
growl or the fiery eye warns him of mor- 
tal peril. 

Under the protection of God, like the 
Royal Prophet, he ceases to fear enemies 



GREATER VIGILANCE. 261 

who are powerless against a strong faith 
pointing to eternal happiness and a firm 
hope which gains those especial graces 
promised to implicit confidence. He no 
longer regards the enemy whom he had 
thought well-nigh invincible ; he despises 
him or attacks him with confidence, and 
in such dispositions he meets with an 
easy victory. This grace, frequently re- 
newed, teaches him all the more the ex- 
tent of God's goodness and mercy in his 
regard, and in return his love grows fer- 
vent and strong. Temptations, then, prop- 
erly understood and met according to the 
spirit of religion, attach us more closely 
to God by the great virtues of faith, 
hope, and charity, to the frequent exer- 
cise of which they oblige us. 

On the other hand, the conviction of 
our weakness inevitably excites us to 
greater vigilance. A weak man is a timid 



262 GREATER VIGILANCE. 

man — timid in proportion to his weak- 
ness. That weakness makes him very care- 
ful not to make to himself enemies, and 
to avoid the anger of those whom he has 
already made. He is attentive to his own 
behavior and weighs every word. Doubt- 
ful of his own strength he seeks to attack 
no one. This conduct is but a figure of 
the precaution which a Christian should 
take. He avoids with care whatever may 
excite the temptations to which he is sub- 
ject, whatever may give rise to new and 
untried dangers. He knows who it is that 
says, "He that loveth danger shall perish 
in it" (Eccles. iii. 27). In the fear of being 
left to his own weakness by rendering 
himself, through presumption, unworthy 
of the assistance of heaven, he is all atten- 
tion to what passes in his mind and heart, 
lest some new enemy should creep in, or 
lest those already there concealed, taking 



GREATER VIGILANCE. 263 

advantage of his negligence, should take 
him by surprise, gain him with the poi- 
soned sweetness of passion, and force him 
to the precipice. 

Vigilance is the more necessary, because 
the temptation is not unfrequently dis- 
guised. It uses stratagem, it alleges false 
pretexts, it takes upon itself the appearance 
of virtue so as to draw the soul quietly to 
the fatal trap. Passion often conceals 
itself lest it should be recognized. It will 
insinuate itself insensibly into the heart, 
and disguise itself so as to enter unper- 
ceived. He who is inattentive to its ap- 
proach gives it time to fortify itself or 
fails to erect a barrier strong enough to 
resist its attack. On the contrary, he who 
is exercised in the spiritual warfare and 
aware of the danger of new temptations, or 
of giving the slightest way to the old, is 
always on the alert to detect the slightest 



264 GREATER VIGILANCE. 

movement of his heart. He examines the 
nature of his feelings and no sooner does 
he perceive the enemy than he challenges 
him and stands to his own defence. 

And this vigilance is an assured bulwark 
against temptations, whether from without 
or from within. With it there can be no 
surprise, and the enemy finds the garrison 
prepared at all points. 

In time of peace and calm, precaution is 
regarded as superfluous. But in time of 
war or in the midst of the tempest, we 
must be vigilant to escape shipwreck or 
defeat. And so it is that frequency of 
temptation begets vigilance, and vigilance 
causes a stricter union with God, and from 
this union springs docility to the inspira- 
tions of the Holy Ghost, and docility leads 
us in the path of perfection. 



GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION. 265 



CHAPTER XXXVI. 

THE GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION IN NEGLI- 
GENT SOULS. 

Temptations, which seemed destined to 
be the certain ruin of negligent souls, have 
not unfrequently been a heaven-provided 
means of rescuing them from the tepidity 
in which they lived and of leading them 
to the fervent practice of virtue. There 
are persons who live a life of languishing 
piety. No marked disorder is visible in 
their general conduct, but neither is there 
any endeavor after perfection. If they do 
not commit any of those mortal offences 
which cut us off from God, neither do they 
do any great good, through their indif- 
ference to the mortification of the senses, 
their indulgence of every feeling and in- 
clination not manifestly sinful, and their 



266 GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION. 

habitual disregard of the persistent prin- 
ciples of the faith. Their lives, having 
so little of the supernatural, are but indif- 
ferently meritorious in the sight of God. 
They are vessels becalmed on their voyage 
to heaven. 

Well, God sends a storm to break the 
idle calm. Temptation comes to awake 
slumbering piety, and God, enlightening 
them as to their state, draws them kindly to 
Him by His grace. They see themselves 
on the eve of perils from which they 
shrink affrighted. They find themselves 
beset by enemies alternately employing 
charms and fears to seduce or to intimi- 
date. Religion then makes herself known 
in all her strength. Alarmed at the 
danger they have recourse to God in 
whom alone they can have confidence of 
a favorable issue to the combat. If the 
assaults are renewed, they think seriously 



GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION. 267 

and resolutely of employing all the means 
which faith can offer to escape the im- 
pending ruin. 

Henceforth, earnest in prayer, by which 
they hope to obtain the required strength ; 
united with God, to whom a lively sense 
of danger has recalled them; watchful 
over themselves, so as not to fall into the 
snares prepared for them, — they act only 
from motives of piety and live in the con- 
tinual exercise of virtue. All that they 
desire, all that they do, is offered up as an 
act of homage to God. The more they 
are assailed by temptations, the more 
firmly do they determine to continue in 
the path which alone conducts to a place 
of safety. From a life of tepidity they 
enter on a life of fervor in which every 
moment is consecrated to God. 

This change necessarily takes place in 
us if we are faithful to grace. For, 



268 GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION. 

attacked by temptations, seeing our sal- 
vation at stake and wishing to avoid a 
loss that is irreparable, however slightly 
we may reason from the principles of faith, 
we cannot but recognize that it would be 
presumption, and a very sinful presumption, 
to expect, from the hands of God, a victory 
which we take no steps to insure. To 
live a tepid and dissipated life, to omit or 
negligently to perform our accustomed 
exercises of piety, to approach the sacra- 
ments rarely and with but little prepara- 
tion, to be careless about the commission 
of venial sins and yet to expect from the 
mercy of God the grace to resist our 
passions, — is only to tempt Him, to render 
ourselves unworthy of His assistance, to 
deserve that we should be abandoned to 
our own weakness and become the slave 
of sin. 

With such dispositions, a tepid and neg- 



GOOD EFFECTS OF TEMPTATION. 269 

ligent soul cannot be said, with justice, 
really to intend resistance ; for, to wish the 
end whilst we reject the means is not to 
wish at all. God must then say as He 
said to His chosen people : " Destruction is 
thy own, O Israel: thy help is only in Me" 
(Osee, xiii. 9). It is not of such that I treat, 
but rather of those who, in spite of their 
tepidity, fear sin and love God enough to 
shrink from a mortal offence, and to adopt 
the means which are necessary for their 
preservation. To such souls temptations 
are very useful, arousing them from their 
sloth and exciting their fervor. 

Those who treat of the spiritual life 
teach us that God sometimes permits a 
tepid soul to fall into some grievous fault, 
in order to rouse it from its lethargy by 
the remorse which follows sin. 



270 OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 

CHAPTER XXXVII. 

THE TIME SPENT IN OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS 
IS NOT TIME LOST. 

Some persons, much subject to tempta- 
tions, lament the time which they spend 
in resisting them. I cannot, they say, 
preserve recollection. When I try to 
meditate, to recite some prayers, to spend 
a few moments in the presence of the 
Blessed Sacrament, I cannot fix my mind 
on God. That is the very time that 
temptations come to assail me ; and I pass 
it in a vain endeavor to banish them. I 
meet these troublesome and obstinate 
visitors even at the holy table, when I 
go to receive my Lord and my God. 
What profit can I expect from pious exer- 
cises performed in such a manner ? 

This thought brings great discourage- 
ment. To cure this, to reassure and 



OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 271 

console such persons, it is important to 
recall to them the principles by which to 
correct their error and the advantages of 
such a state when borne as it should be. 
It is a maxim universally acknowledged 
that we are not called to serve God accord- 
ing to our own feelings and inclinations, 
but in the way which He requires and 
according to His good-will. God attaches 
His graces and rewards, not precisely to 
the good works which we prescribe for 
ourselves, but to those which He author- 
izes and enjoins. It is on this principle 
that is based the decision that, if obedience 
prescribes an employment which keeps us 
from prayer or meditation, by performing 
the action in a spirit of recollection we 
please God just as much as if we had 
spent the time in communion with Him. 
And if we were to omit the action for the 
sake of praying or meditating, we should 



272 OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 

not be serving God as He requires; we 
should offend instead of serving Him. 
This principle should suffice to convince 
you that you do not lose the time which 
you pass in resisting temptations that 
occur during your exercises of piety. 
The devil has no more power over men 
than God allows to him. It was only by 
an express permission that he was enabled 
to subject the patient Job to so many 
trials and temptations. God permits this 
state in which you find yourself; and as 
distractions are a species of temptation, 
you must apply to them what I have just 
been saying. 

How then does God wish that you 
should serve Him ? Is it by a sustained 
and uninterrupted meditation on holy 
things? Is it by tender colloquies with 
Himself which no earthly affection shall 
be allowed to disturb? Not so; He 



OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 273 

wishes you to serve Him by a faithful and 
persevering resistance to all the inspira- 
tions of the enemy, by which he strives to 
seduce and separate you from the divine 
love; that, like the Jews rebuilding the 
walls of Jerusalem, one hand should grasp 
the sword of defensive warfare whilst the 
other labors to erect the spiritual edifice of 
perfection in a sentiment of lively faith and 
unshaken hope — a hope, I mean, unshaken 
in your will, however it may seem to waver 
in your imagination. Has such been your 
fidelity ? Then you have done the will of 
God; you have honored Him as He re- 
quired; you have put Him above every- 
thing else ; you have in your submission, 
and patience, and fidelity in resisting 
temptation, been as pleasing to Him as 
though you had been occupied in an 
ecstasy of fervent prayer distinguished by 
the most affectionate sentiments. 



274 OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 

I ask you, how can that time be lost 
which is spent in conformity to the will of 
God and in the exhibition of so marked 
and solid an attachment to Him ? After 
such an exercise, in which you have 
courageously resisted all the attacks of 
your enemies, you should be as well satis- 
fied as if you had performed it in the 
greatest recollection and tranquillity. It 
had less savor and sweetness, but the fruit 
was all the richer. You have done the 
will of God, and He will acknowledge it 
in the graces with which He will enrich 
your soul. The accomplishment of that 
will was painful ; the pain will not be 
forgotten in the recompense. The Holy 
Ghost assures us by the mouth of the 
Apostle : " God is not unjust, that He 
should forget your work, and the love which 
you have shown in His name" (Heb.vi. 10). 

The time, therefore, so employed is not 



OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 275 

lost, not only because we render God the 
honor and service which He asks at our 
hands and in the very way He asks it, 
but, also, because in these combats we 
acquire merits which are being multiplied 
in every minute. Persecutions that in- 
creased the sufferings of the martyrs 
enriched their crown of triumph ; tempta- 
tions are a persecution that has the same 
effect in a faithful soul. 

The Holy Ghost declares him blessed, 
who " could have transgressed, and hath not 
transgressed ; who could do evil things, 
and hath not done them " (Eccles. xxxi. 10). 
His happiness is proportioned to the merit 
which he amassed by his perseverance. 
On this principle, when you observe the 
law of God and do His will in a way that 
is displeasing to nature, you acquire a 
double claim to reward: first, you have 
obeyed, and secondly, you have obeyed 



276 OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 

with difficulty, and against resistance and 
combat. The sacrifice which you have 
made of the natural inclination which 
solicited and impelled you, is rewarded 
here by new graces, and hereafter by an 
increase of eternal glory and happiness. 

Following up this reasoning, what an 
immense treasure of merit that person 
accumulates who, assailed by all kinds of 
temptations, is steadfast in clinging to 
God ! He is certain that every sacrifice 
was noted ; every one had its merit, every 
one shall have its recompense. On each 
separate occasion that he resisted tempta- 
tion, it could be said of him, " Blessed is he, 
for he could have transgressed, and hath 
not transgressed ; he could do evil things, 
and hath not done them? And what a 
vast number of sacrifices are made by that 
one who, often drawn and urged by pas- 
sion, constantly resists its seductions and 



OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 277 

refuses the object which it presents to his 
concupiscence. Few moments pass un- 
marked by victory. The repeated and 
varied assaults of the enemy only serve to 
swell the number of victims which the 
faithful warrior immolates to God. What 
a treasure of merits in these hand-to-hand 
struggles with passion ! We do not our- 
selves perceive every sacrifice which we 
make, but the all-seeing eye of God does 
not suffer one to escape. Is anything 
more needed to console us in this state 
and to encourage us to perseverance ? If 
the contest is severe, the crown is brilliant ; 
one minute of pain, and an eternity of 
glory ! And who would wish to exchange 
eternal glory for a minute's gratification ? 
Nor is the merit restricted to these re- 
peated sacrifices ; new treasures are found 
in the interior virtues practised at such 
a time. We feel very well that we can- 



278 OVERCOMING TEMPTATIONS. 

not maintain successful resistance with- 
out the aid of heaven, without the light 
and the motives of faith, the inspirations 
of hope, and the support of divine charity. 
Our heart is occupied in a continual exer- 
cise of prayer and in forming repeated 
acts of these exalted virtues. If one sole 
act of divine charity is so powerful as to 
reconcile a sinner with God, how much 
merit does he not acquire who in his 
combats is constantly repeating this act ! 
What ignorance, then, to suppose that 
time so employed in resisting temptation 
is lost for heaven and perfection, when, 
on the contrary, it is evident from what 
has been said that we are laboring most 
actively to practise the one and gain the 
other ! 



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